To Teach While Entertaining
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New Year is a holiday liked by everybody and traditionally celebrated by the staff of all branches and calibers. Though, in the majority of cases the essence of its “work” hypostasis is limited to sharing booze and other kinds of moral decay. Or – to showing off how supercool and rich the company is and to self-expression of its management (though this kind has much slipped in popularity in times of crisis).
While the correct PR demonstrates that these events can be an effective instrument of communications. Though it is spoken less frequently in comparison with the HR aspect – in terms of understanding possibilities that open up for teambuilding and appreciating corporate culture values.
It happens most often because:
It is much easier to write just a creative script book, to hold a corporate amateur arts festival and to send for “stars” than to “trim” the text aimed at the internal target audience with message-box elements with pinpoint accuracy. One can make a film about themselves from beginning to end of the party, one can pay for a shadow show and order a sexy Snow Maiden in a cake. Or one can remind about the company’s place in the world, its strategy and key objectives with light but eye-catching touches. Once upon a time, we had to bring to the knowledge of employees of a very rebranded bank the main idea of their management that there would be no more redundancies, the repressions are gone, they can sleep a peaceful sleep.
Not always a PR expert is allowed to take part in organizing a company party – the bigger the budget the more often it is done by a supply manager or (which is worse) the owner’s wife. As a result of this corrupt/homespun approach I participated in madly expensive corporate parties where second or third-rate drawn actors performed, the owner was sitting with a set face and tried to escape at the earliest opportunity, the staff was “hitting the bottle” and waiting for the owner to escape.
On the eve of holidays “ploicymakers” are also tired (budgeting, reporting, planning vacations) and prefer the line of least resistance. Because creating an ideologically-considered script needs participation of the top management – at least in terms of getting approvals.
That is why it is everybody’s personal preference whether to try and plan a New Year company party or to confine themselves to the functions of “entertaining” and “surprising”. But if there is at least a tiny chance for PR trimming, don’t be lazy, the potential is huge – the staff are compacted in one place, the mood is (should be) positive, people are open (should be) to new impressions and new information. Fill the form with content and the image with ideas and you will never feel sorry. Nothing can stick in people's minds better than a thought shared when communicating, acting, empathizing – only in this case people feel that it is their own.
Tags: Free time; PR; PR industry; Reputation