The part entitled "Expanding a PLan into a Proposal" caught my attention in this chapter. It talked about preparing proposals for their clients and how it contained all of these different things... an executive summary, a situation analysis, a statement of purpose, a list of publics, other things, blah, blah, blah... and I compared it to people in life. Life is a proposal. When you meet people, you are your own proposal. You may be a shitty person, but you also may be really attractive and dress nicely, so you're gonna get more dates and stuff. On the other hand, you may be a kick ass person, but if you dress like a slob, nobody is gonna take a second look at you unless it's maybe to laugh. It's kind of like the movie "Shallow Hal" or "The Truth About Cats and Dogs." So in PR, you want to be the good looking person. You want to get the dates. You want to maximize your positive attributes, and minimize your shortcomings (granted you even have any.) You are your own product, and you want people to invest in you: you want their trust, their friendship, their time.

The chapter explains how tactics are the smallest building block of enacting a plan. BUT, even though they may be small things, not doing them correctly screws everything else up. This is what I love about the little things in life: without doing them right, the big things go all to hell. You want an 'A' in a class, but you can't get the grade unless you turn in your homework. You want to lose weight, but you can't do that unless you lay off the double cheeseburger for dinner. Doing the little things in life correctly can snowball into making you successful in reaching your goals. And that makes reaching those goals a little easier. It's all about baby steps. It's all about taking those little things in life, a favor from a friend, a smile from a stranger on the street, a pair of new socks, and not taking them all for granted. Every little thing is important, and everything adds on itself.

I like writing. I want to be a better writer, and I am ready and willing to learn. I think that it is sad how many people cannot even write a complete sentence correctly. Nobody knows how to spell anymore. Nobody knows the difference between "your" and "you're." I think that sharpening my writing skills will put me ahead of the game. And the more pathetic thing is, I probably have made mistakes in this blog that I am not even aware of. Depsite this, I know I can write better than a majority of people. For guys, it is a turn-off to me if he cannot write well or if he doesn't have proper grammar. What happened to everybody? Why does nobody know how to speak english anymore? It's because we were not taught correctly, or we were too lazy to pay attention. It's stupid.
One thing I have come to understand about writing is that it is a process. A good piece of writing requires editing, editing, and more editing. It requires research. It requires TIME. I'm the type of person that has to get in a certain zone in order to sacrifice that time, and that is part of my downfall in assignments I do not succeed in, but overall, I am willing to buy into the system because I believe in it.

The Digital Age really just blows my mind. Think about how connected we are to our personal computers, our cell phones, our television sets. My cell phone is practically my child. I lose my car keys probably weekly, but I always know where my cell phone is. Myspace and Facebook rule my life and hinder my educational work. It is a disease. In many ways, such as improving the speed and quality of communication and the creation of virutal public relations agencies, the Digital Age is awesome. But in other ways, like the ones I have listed above, I think it is a devilish thing. How different would we be as people if we didn't have internet? How different would our day-to-day lives be if we couldn't call somebody when we were bored walking back to our cars after class? Despite all of the opportunities technology has opened for us, it has consumed our lives so much and I think that too many people take advantage of the negative aspects of technology.

Thinking about how many businesses DON'T have business continuity plans just reminds me of my procrastination problem and how my priorities are not always in order. In the book, they said half of all companies don't have a plan, and an even a larger percentage has not practiced theirs. It reminds me of how I put off some things that matter until the last minute (coughbloggingcough). And I don't think that businesses don't have plans because of this same thing exactly, but then again in some way, they both relate. From all of the hype about business crisis communication plans' importance, all companies in some light know of its importance, but maybe a lot of them refuse to face it because they have too many other things going on. Companies that don't have a plan entact have put it off because it is not a priority to them, when in fact, if something were to happen and they did not have a plan, their chances of surviving are slim to none. I think the issue of businesses not having these plans in order is like the old saying "you don't know what you have until it's gone."

The Public Relations and Marketing chapter was a lot of information. I think that part I like least about PR will be the marketing aspect of it all... and I know that doesn't make much sense, because Public Relations is largely that, but all I can think of when I hear the word "marketing" is my Money and Marketing class that almost drove me to suicide. I know that there is more to marketing though that what it has to do with money, so I'm probably totally wrong. I so badly want to love whatever my job ends up being. I think waking up and wanting to do the things you are obligated to do makes you such a healthier person, and that's what life is all about.
After working on the media kit, I'm anticipating doing my next one. Moreso, I'm more looking forward to actually knowing more information on the background of my topic in a media kit to see what my real potential is. With the pandemic media kit we made up, I feel like I b.s.'d a ton of it, and I didn't like that about the project. I guess it was my fault for not putting more time into the research part of it, but it was hard for me to get into it without feeling some personal attachment to the company.

I can identify with Chapter 14. My mother was born in Japan and grew up in Canada, and my dad was born in Germany and worked in England, Switzerland, Canada, and is currently working in China. Because of my parents' pasts and heritage, I have had the opportunity to visit almost all of these places. I have had first-hand experience with different ways of life from many cultures of the world. Two summers ago, I went to Beijing for a month. EVERYTHING was different: how people greeted each other, how someone accepted a present, the way people drove, the fact that everybody hauked loogies in the middle of the street, the way they ate. It was a completely different set of rules. Being aware of all of these changes and tweeking my habits helped me feel more accepted there. I think it is important to not seem so "American" when we visit other places. I think it is important to take into consideration other peoples cultures and when appropriate to cater to their differences and adapt. So many Americans have this belief of ethical imperialism i think, and it annoys me. It embarrases me, too. When we were at DFW airport coming back from somewhere overseas one time, I remember being in the baggage claim and someone coming over the loudspeaker and absolutely BUTCHERING someone's last name. I thought to myself, "Only in America..."

I think about people like Ivy Lee, the supposed "Father of Public Relations" to some, and it makes me think about the founders of other things and how they came up with them. For some reason I immediately thought of how penicillin was founded by mistake ... I don't know. Random. It makes me think of how a little idea or whatever can turn in to something so huge... something that changes how things in life are. Just thinking of how Ivy sent out a bulletin stating what had happened after the train wreck in Pennsylvania in whatever year has snowballed into a way of life for thousands of people makes me think of the power the little things in life have.

WHAT IS COMPOPSED OF THE FIRST PHASE OF THE PANDEMIC PLAN? A master list of employees complete with each one’s contact information including a record of “essential employees.” It also consists of a list of recommendations for employees to follow which include: making sure that all of employees have a direct deposit of all paychecks, adjusting worker sick leave and disability guidelines in case of pandemic, maintaining a healthy relationship with the company's health insurance provider for special services, and updating employee emergency contact listings.

WHAT IS SOUTHWESTERN ENERGY MATRIX’S GOAL WITH THE PANDEMIC PLAN? To educate all of SEM’s employees of their pandemic plan and make the modifications necessary to ensure the safety of all persons involved. SEM is working to make the plan as efficient and effective as possible. In the event of some pandemic event, SEM wants to make sure that its company is prepared to the highest level possible in order to restore normal operations as soon as possible.

SOME OF SOUTHWESTERN ENERGY MATRIX’S ONGOING PROJECTS WITHIN THIS PLAN INCLUDE:

• Identify essential employees and other critical inputs (e.g. raw materials, suppliers, sub-contractor services/ products, and logistics) required to maintain business operations by location and function during a pandemic.
• Train and prepare ancillary workforce (e.g. contractors, employees in other job titles/descriptions, retirees).
• Determine potential impact of a pandemic on company business financials using multiple possible scenarios that affect different product lines and/or production sites.
• Determine potential impact of a pandemic on business-related domestic and international travel (e.g. quarantines, border closures).
• Implement guidelines to modify the frequency and type of face-to-face contact (e.g. hand-shaking, seating in meetings, office layout, shared workstations) among employees and between employees and customers (refer to CDC recommendations).
• Evaluate employee access to and availability of healthcare services during a pandemic, and improve services as needed.
• Evaluate employee access to and availability of mental health and social services during a pandemic, including corporate, community, and faith-based resources, and improve services as needed.
• Identify employees and key customers with special needs, and incorporate the requirements of such persons into your preparedness plan (from Pandemicflu.gov)

Businesses have to put their employee's safety at the utmost importance. The teamwork of employees after a crisis is critical. Everyone must be informed of what to do, when to do it, and how to do it. It isn't a simple endeavor. There are so many things to consider, and to cover every aspect, it takes a number of people and constant alterations.

Business Continuity Plan #1: MIT Master Plan
Planning for the business continuity of MIT in the aftermath of a disaster is a complex task. Preparation for, response to, and recovery from a disaster affecting the administrative functions of the Institute requires the cooperative efforts of many support organizations in partnership with the functional areas supporting the "business" of MIT.

As the written record of the Institute's Business Continuity Plan, this document is distributed to each member of the Business Continuity Management Team, including members of the Institute Support Teams. It is also distributed to members of the Administrative Computing Steering Committee, FARM Team Coordinators, Information Systems Directors and others not primarily involved with the direct recover effort..

The Plan identifies the critical functions of MIT and the resources required to support them. The Plan provides guidelines for ensuring that needed personnel and resources are available for both disaster preparation and response and that the proper steps will be carried out to permit the timely restoration of services.

Quarterly, the Business Continuity Management Team Coordinators ensures that the Plan undergoes a more formal review to confirm the incorporation of all changes since the prior quarter. Annually, the Business Continuity Management Team Coordinators initiates a complete review of the Plan, which could result in major revisions to this document. These revisions will be distributed to all authorized personnel, who exchange their old plans for the newly revised plans. At that time the Coordinators will provide an annual status report on continuity planning to the Administrative Computing Steering Committee.

Business Continuity Management Team:
Director of Insurance and Legal Affairs. Provides liaison to insurance carriers and claims adjusters. Coordinates insurance program with continuity planning programs
Director, MIT News Office. Communicates with the news media, public, staff, faculty, and student body who are not involved in the recovery operation.
Personnel Department. Provides support for human resources elements of recovery and staff notification through the emergency broadcast service.

Institute Support Teams:
Public Information The interface with the media, the general public and faculty, staff and students who are not participating in the recovery process is handled by the MIT News Office, working closely with the Personnel Department.

Campus Police initiative: To provide for all facets of a positive security and safety posture, to assure that proper protection and safeguards are afforded all MIT employees and Institute assets at both the damaged and backup sites.

Public Information Officer If employee injuries or fatalities are involved, notify Personnel to send appropriate management personnel to the homes of the involved families.

Public Information Officer Coordinate follow-up news releases after the immediate emergency has passed to present the Institute in as positive light as possible. Possible topics could include: What has been done to prevent recurrence of this type of emergency? What are plans for reconstruction? What has been done to express gratitude to the community for it's help? What has been done to help employees, students and faculty?

#2 IBM

The current threat of a worldwide avian flu pandemic is driving new issues surrounding human capital resiliency into the spotlight. Recent projections suggest that avian flu could potentially infect millions of people over an undefined period of time. In one severe pandemic scenario, it's predicted that 30 percent of employees would become ill, missing an average of three weeks of work.¹

Although companies are beginning to look for ways to minimize the impact of a potential avian flu pandemic, few have fully addressed the human side of crisis preparedness. In a recent survey, only 34 percent of companies indicated that human resource issues formed a significant part of their organization’s business continuity or disaster plans. Thirty-six percent indicated that these issues were only somewhat part of their plans.²

In a crisis, many organizations will be challenged to safeguard and support employees while continuing to deliver the services needed to keep the business operational and revenue flowing. IBM has identified three primary areas in which human capital issues and risks associated with crises can be grouped:

• Ability to attend work
• Ability to deliver critical internal services
• Ability to maintain business operations

This white paper presents a framework designed to help you address these issues and risks. The responsibilities for effectively identifying and addressing the human dimensions of your business continuity plan stretch across the organization, including these areas:

• Policies and communications
• Employee education and support
• Virtual infrastructure
• Job training
• Talent management
• HR systems and reporting
• Organizational culture

To help businesses evaluate their level of preparedness and take steps to mitigate risk, IBM offers the Contingency Planning Assessment. Experienced IBM business continuity and crisis management consultants can work with you to review and assess your readiness related to these key areas.

I thoroughly enjoyed this chapter. It's so weird and coincidental that this chapter covered the topics it did, because I've been doing a lot of self-searching and evaluating of my own life lately. Chapter 5 kind of gave a few guidelines to follow not only in the Public Relations world, but in everyday life as well. I think that's a big part of why I am so drawn to this field.

• Living a values-driven life is important to me
  
• Effective communication is something that I strive to achieve in all of my relationships
  
• I believe that there is always an exception to the rule, as there is when looking at public opinion
• People can't change unless they want to, and that only takes place with negotiation, persuasion, and motivation
  
• Life is about building and maintaining relationships
  

And I am passionate about focusing on those aspects. I care about making things better. I am genuniely interested in understanding why people think the way that they do, and I actively try to make the best of every situation I'm put in. I just took a personality test with my team the other day, and there were four possible outcomes: activator, analyst, peacemaker, and organizer. Granted, any answer could have attributes that fit the personality to work in the PR field, I was overwhelmingly a peacemaker, and I really beileve that trying to keep the peace is largely what Public Relations is all about. I have a sincere interest in understanding groups or indivduals and to constantly check my surroundings in order to adjust and keep things O.K. I like doing that. My mind is not on a one-track course, and I also think that I am dynamic, an ingredient the field calls for.

The excerpt that we were asked to discuss from the Homeland Security site was not impressive to me. The first page gave a game plan that was really vague and which covered broad topic problems, and I found it funny when I continued to read and saw that the author was aware of the same conclusions. It seems like there is a lot of red tape that government has to get through in order to move information to the places it needs to be. I think that "red tape" is a problem in America on a whole: things aren't simple. There are so many precautions taken and additional securities put on things and barriers because people aren't trustworthy or on the same page about things. Society is corrupt. It's like we have this plan that we put in place in order to keep our country safe, but WE are the ones holding ourselves back from implementing it. It's like we have the solution, but we are the roadblock in the way of accomplishing it. I just think that different sectors have different priorities and are so unwilling to budge, that we're kicking ourselves in the ass. We're trying to fight an external war, when all the while we're adding a war within our own country.

Chapter 3... I thought it was the least interesting chapter so far. Although, after going through this chapter, it was made more clear to me how necessary the public relations profession is in our world. And not only was its importance made more apparent, but more specifically how naturally it fits in to so many aspects of the business world. I realized that this profession will always be sought after, because we are needed in time of tragedy, upbringing, trend setting, expansion, downsizing, and in every other type of development. Is there a big business boom? Somebody's gonna have to coordinate the new activity and let the public know what is up and coming. Did somebody really screw something up in an organization? Well, you're gonna need somebody to go out there and explain to everybody what the hell is going on and how it's gonna be fixed. I like the idea of how part of our job is to be able to find a way to tell people, "Things are gonna be O.K." The part that makes me unesasy is what extents some PR professionals have gone to bend that statement.

The page that drew my attention the most was one of the last pages that just kind of put the ups and downs of the profession in a summary. In particular, the sentence, "If anything, we have become more aware of how much our world is interconnected-and often dysfunctional."
This got me because that's what everything pretty much boils down to. The world is messed up. We need people devote their lives to maintaining relationships between publics because people can't get along. People are always going to disagree. People are always going to have different perspectives on how to handle a new situation. And none of that is ever going to change. Then that made me start thinking about people who have gone under the gun, like for instance, this lady from the Red Cross, Healy. I mean, she didn't try to screw the Liberty Fund thing up. Like, I'm pretty sure that her main objective was not to get herself to be forced to resign and have thousands and thousands of people mad at her. Granted, you've gotta wonder what she was thinking to screw up as big as she did, something in her head obviously made her think that she was doing the best possible thing. And somebody had to have agreed with her. I don't know, just kind of blows my mind. Makes you think about what kind of pressures and stresses she was put under at that time to make her blind as to what her outcomes would be after the rash decisions she made. It makes me want to be 5 years old again so all I have to be stressed about is coloring in between the lines in my coloring book.
Another big word from the sentence I noted above was "interconnected." SO true. I think that this word is so true that it's scary. Like, I have learned to treat everybody with utmost respect. Everybody. Even someone who you think can do you absolutely no good, it doesn't matter. Because somebody is always watching you. And that guy that you think is a nobody knows a somebody, and somehow things come back to bite you if you take a wrong step. Because our world is so small. You have to be so aware of the moves you make in the field, like for instance, Ivy Lee, because no matter what scale of work you are engaged in, somebody knows somebody who knows somebody who knows what every move you have made.

I'm starting to get more and more into the book. I'm glad that I'm forced to write these blogs, because it's making me actually read the material, which is definitely more than I can say for my other classes :)

Person #1
What is public relations?
Interacting with people. A person in PR has to have a good personality, be very talkative, and be outgoing.

Name someone in a high-profile PR job.
Marilyn Monroe: She interacts with her public and has relations with them.

Now, explain your definition for PR, derived from the textbook and class discussion. Ask their impression of this definition.
She said that she basically had that same idea of what PR was except for she had in mind that a PR manager or technician only interacted with one person or a group of people one time. She wasn't aware that a PR practitioner had to work on building relationships with their clients.

Person #2
What is public relations?
How politicians see the public and how they correspond with what goes on in the world.

Name someone in a high-profile PR job.
Condoleeza Rice: I hear about her a lot in the news and on comedy shows. She is in the public eye a lot, and she makes a lot of differences in the White House.

Now, explain your definition for PR, derived from the textbook and class discussion. Ask their impression of this definition.
She thought that my definition seemed more appropriate and that it grasped a broader scope than hers. She also wanted me to mention that her GPA is more than a point lower than mine, and that she doesn't have a clue of what she is talking about.

Person #3
What is public relations?
Communicating with people, talking a lot, the same thing as marketing.

Name someone in a high-profile PR job.
George Bush. He makes a lot of speeches.

Now, explain your definition for PR, derived from the textbook and class discussion. Ask their impression of this definition.
I think that it's similar to what I said but just worded differently. It made me have a better understanding of the whole job description.

The biggest thing that I noticed about my first question to them was how they all seemed to think that public relations was a verb! Their first words in their answers were things like "communicating" or "interacting." And that's not incorrect, but if I were to answer the question, my response would start with something like, "A person who...." I mean, if I asked what a firefighter was, they wouldn't have had an answer beginning with, "Putting out fires." So that was really interesting to me. It showed me how unfamiliar people are with the profession.

When I asked the second question, I got the same facial expression from every single respondent. It pretty much consisted of a look similar to that of "The Rock," a shoulder shrug, and a long period of silence. Although none of the answers were correct in that none of the people's job titles include the words "public relations," I did realize that each person answered who they did because they felt their answer choices had attributes that all public relations practitioners should indeed have. They all deal with publics and try to withhold healthy relationships with them. It didn't surprise me that two of the three answers given to me were personalities in the political science field. I think that a lot of people are under the impression that the public relations field only fills jobs in the government, when we all know that in reality the government doesn't even fill the largest amount of jobs out of all the PR employment settings.

On my third question, I thought that my answers were rather blah. I guess I could have done something to spice them up a bit by asking more probing questions. I didn't. An ongoing theme in the answers was that they learned something by my definition. They didn't really have a full understanding beforehand of what the job entailed, and after they learned my defintion, their cloudiness about the subject seemed to lift.

Definition of PR.

I'm going to keep this short.

The occupation of processing and managing the relationship between an organization and its publics.

I hope that there is no wrong answer for this question.

Chapter One... pretty much an overview of the Public Relations world: what tasks are involved in the job description, the bad rep that the profession is trying to shake, the confusion and debate over its definition, and the potential that this relatively new field possesses. Within the chapter, there was a breakdown of the steps involved in the public relations process as well as the elements that compose the public relations field. An ongoing word brought up was "values": more specifically, the values-driven public relations. The chapter also overviewed the increasingly popular theme of assuming responsibility and accountability while practicing this up and coming profession.

I'm new to this major. I feel like I just fell asleep, woke up, and found myself here. I ran out of core classes and had to pick a direction, and one of my friends informally mentioned that I may have a knack for PR, so I just jumped in. I don't really know what I'm getting myself in to... and some of the things that Ch 1 said kind of erked me, but at the same time, I think that my personality fits the profile of many of PR's demands. I know that I want to deal with people, even though most everybody is a pain in the ass, and I want to be able to be in a position where I can make a difference somewhere. One thing that really draws me to PR is that it is a growing field. It seems like there is so much room for change and opportunity, and that excites me. When everybody in class was talking about their experiences that they have already had in the field, it kind of made me feel inadequate, but then I realized that everybody was in my shoes at one time, too. So I am O.K. with that. On one of the first pages where it asked, "What did you think public relations was?" I was one of those few that said, "I don't know." I literally highlighted "I don't know" in my book. But the chapter somewhat made me feel better about not knowing exactly what it was, because apparently nobody else knows either. I really enjoyed Judy Phair's memo that was at the end of the chapter. Her bullet points mentioned in her little blurb are really things that I think that I can commit to. I like the idea that in this field you have to stay open-minded and current. I feel like I have a worldly background; both my mom and dad are from out of the country, and my dad currently works in China, and I have had the opportunity to travel, so I fit the mold in that aspect. And I am full-heartedly willing to jump in this field with open arms and go where ever it takes me. So that makes me a little more at peace with my decision to go into PR. The chapter was well-written and I think did a good job of setting the tone for the rest of the book. There is a lot of information, but I am ready to test myself and curious to see how much I end up liking or hating it.