Oopsie Daisy, Dixie

This week some of you may have seen the piece in The West's Inside Cover regarding the Mt Weld mine media release sent out by the Premier's office. (If not, here's a screen capture above. It may be a bit tricky to read, sorry!) It's a great example of a potentially damaging situation being fixed by a PR professional.

As the article says, the media release included quotes from the Premier, however it was later found one of these quotes regarding the 'rare earths' being mined in the area was actually a passage from the Lynas Corporation's website.

So firstly, a bit of context as to how state government releases work...

Sometimes as an electorate office we will recieve media statements drafted by the PR and media people at DPC (Department of Premier and Cabinet) for use in our electorate. Obviously if the issue is relevent to other electorates they will receive a copy as well, so the same release (or perhaps slightly changed) release will be sent out to more than one office for use. That means it's my job as the John's research officer in Kalamunda to make sure everything in that release is a) relevent and suitable for the area, and b) the quotes are cleared with John and if necessary new quotes are made by him. Whilst it's okay for the same information to be sent to multiple publications in multiple electorates, (you can't, and wouldn't, change information that is correct) we don't want the same quotes to be attributed to more than one politician. The releases of this nature are always labelled as drafts and are to be edited by us, but provide us with a great framework filled with first-hand information from reliable sources. While the release for the Mt Weld mine was not a release of this nature- it originate from the Premier's office for the sole use of the Premier, it's still good to understand how these things sometimes work. A lot of research goes in to everything sent out from State Government offices, and a lot of liaising with different offices and departments goes on behind the scenes to make sure information sent out to the public and the media is correct.

Dixie took the blame (very skillfully in my opinion) for the quote mix-up, and I think she did a great job of explaining the situation. The information in the release wasn't wrong, (in fact it was spot on) the mistake came when the quotation marks were put around the paragraph as a quote from the Premier. At least it goes to show she's gathering information for the release from the appropriate source!

As is often the mantra in our office- "We don't want John ending up in Inside Cover!" Thankfully we have a good record! Except for the City of Melville John Day/Malcolm Day mix up a few weeks ago where John was captioned as Malcolm Day - the Adultshop guy- in one of their press releases. A rather obvious mistake that Inside Cover (and we here in the office) had a bit of a laugh at!

Niki Comparti

14296851

I'm on a roll..

Hello lucky ducks, I'm back again...here's my second post...no photos this time though, sorry..

As part of the Liberal Party Electorate training I attended two days’ worth of seminars this week relating to the running of an electorate office. The first day was based around media, with three seminars; ‘communications planning’, ‘local and national media relations’ and ‘digital and e-campaigning’. It was interesting to see the PR practices and tools I’ve learnt through uni be applied specifically to the political world. The first seminar was all about building communication plans, so I had a pretty solid background knowledge on the subject, but it was still good to learn it from a political point of view.

The second day’s morning seminar- ‘fundraising and events management’ was by far the most enjoyable. It was run by the Head of National Training and Operations Adviser from the Office of the Leader of the Opposition. She had so many campaigning stories and it was fascinating to see how a campaign works from the inside.

Her main mantra for fundraising and campaigning is “what’s in it for them, not what’s in it for you”. People aren’t going to want to donate money to your cause if there is nothing in it for them. Changing “can you please donate some money so I can be re-elected” to “I need your help to get re-elected so I can continue to fight against/for (insert local issue here)” (or a more, somewhat aggressive approach which can also be extremely effective in some cases… “I need your help to get rid of Julia Gillard”, “I need your help to get rid of the carbon tax” etc. etc.). Getting rid of the carbon tax is a good example of how this kind of things work; Giving away money isn’t something companies generally like to do (the purpose is to make it, not give it away!) but if an MP was to approach a mining company, or even a small business, in their electorate, and explained to them their need for support in running a campaign to get re-elected and get rid of the carbon tax, it is in their best interest to help them out. Even if they can’t supply them with money, they may be able to provide goods or services. It’s the kind of mantra that can be used for anything, really.

Relating it back to PR-(uni student cap back on) a perfect example of this working is the relationship between journalist and PR professional- if you as the PR professional provide the journalist with fantastic quotes, an exclusive and a local angle then the journalist is likely to want to turn up and print your story. They get a good local story and you get your boss/company in the paper. Good deal.

I can’t tell you everything about my training days as some of you may be Labor party enthusiasts and I can’t go around giving out all the good ideas!! I want to keep my job!! Haha

Niki Comparti

14296851

Curtin Bentley campus

All in a Day's work

I’m a bit behind when it comes to this blog as I’ve actually been at my current job (for which I’ve been allowed to carry out my professional placement) since late May and have been avoiding having to write a blog post since then haha. My role is Research Officer at The Hon John Day MLA’s electorate office in Kalamunda two days per week. (yes, it does take about 40 minutes to type out his proper title at the end of letters and releases haha). John is the Minister for Planning, Arts and Culture, and Science and Innovation, however the tasks I do in his electorate office relate to his role as the Member for Kalamunda. I work alongside his Electorate Officer, Nola, and during the week it is just the two of us in the office, except on Fridays when John is here too.

As the research officer it is my job to liaise with the local media – organise photo opportunities for events John attends, respond on behalf of John to letters written to the editor, and respond to stories in the various local papers (if there's a story about a local or group succeeding in some compacity, John will write them a letter of congratulations).

I’m also in charge of (and started) the monthly e-newsletter. The e-newsletter consists of a variety of ‘good news’ stories from the various media releases relating to the Kalamunda electorate that come to me via email from the respective MPs (stuff about seniors from the Minister for Seniors and Volunteering etc), wrap ups of events John has attended (and hopefully a nice photo) and a local issue that requires John’s response. The first e-newsletter’s main article related to hooning on the local Zig Zag road, and the second e-newsletter (due to be emailed out tomorrow!) focuses on the new Optus mobile phone tower in Gooseberry Hill. The pictures below are from the putting together of, and sending out of, the budget newsletter- which was sent out following the budget announcement (obviously ha) to every letterbox and PO Box in the Kalamunda electorate…..

The third area of my duties here (for which the phone tower is a great segue into) is responding to correspondence from people within the electorate. Every letter, email or phone call received relating to an issue is responded to with a signed letter. The Optus tower has been the hot topic over the past few weeks and yesterday was spent collaborating a written response with John, typing in the individual addresses of each person on the letter and the envelope and sending them out… all 800-odd of them! This is the me-eyed-view of me entering in the names of the people who contacted the office into our online feedback program..

And lastly- we do a lot of stuff for local community groups (Lion's Club, PROBUS, etc). We do photocopying, type up and print newsletters and other odd jobs. The picture below is the name tags I made for the Perth Hills Wine Associtation wine judging night. Fitting them in the name tag thingos took a bit of trial and error...

In regards to PR (and journalism, my other uni minor) I’ve found my studies have definitely helped me so far. Writing media releases for the papers, putting together budget newsletters and John’s e-newsletter, and the public relations skills required to deal with constituents (both happy and mad) have all stemmed from the skills I’ve learnt at uni.

Standby for further thrilling updates haha...

Niki Comparti

14296851

Curtin Bentley Campus