Measuring Up

"Ministries and Departments that are not achieving outcomes and impacts commensurate with the level of resources being given should have such resources decreased. Those that are doing a good job should get more." C. Babb, Letter to the Editor, Barbados Advocate, June 16, 2009.

I wanted to begin with a quote that encompasses the notion of calculating the ROI of PR and I thought this was a great one. It's from a citizen of Barbados, not some title bearing swaggerer who has fifty-eleven postgraduate degrees. This tells me that the average Barbadian is waking up to the reality that these are different times that we are living in, compared to the pig trough era of the past where nepotism and wastage were overlooked in the name of upholding the status quo.

One man coined the phrase 'nepotism with talent' and perhaps this is the next natural step in our evolution to a truly productive nation. The reality is that the average Barbadian is no longer willing to part with his franchise if the nation, particularly the public sector, is going to be run without holding people to the rigorous standards that long permeated the private sector. Every cent, even in so-called too-soft-to-measure PR must be accounted for and justified.

By extension, as I understand Babb, rewards must be aligned with performance. If you do more with less, great; and if you do less with more, you ought to be held up to scrutiny, not just to point out where you are falling below acceptable standards, but with the objective of finding solutions. This has certainly been the fate of many a PR department and sadly their research and development budgets seem to be the first to go. Is it perhaps that we may be weak in these areas and fail to seek help or training as required? Could it also be that our clients or leaders are sending us a strong message about our need to show a positive ROI LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE; a message that we refuse to hear?

According to Michael Weiner, author of Unleashing the Power of PR, to do anything less than demonstrate the value of PR programmes or to cloak your activities with 'trust me' rather than 'I can prove it' and using proper research to do so, is equivalent to malpractice.

I just hope that if PR people ignore my message that at least their executive management and clients don't because someone needs to turn up the heat on this issue which continues to be avoided with pathetic excuses like: it's too time consuming, we don't have the resources and if my performance is less than acceptable management will be justified in using the most punitive measures, blah de blah.

It is time that PR folk stop lying to ourselves and to our stakeholders and start measuring up. Of course, the best place to begin is at the beginning. Like Babb said, set clear outcomes and parameters for qualifying success. IABC has a vast range of of resources to aid in getting started. So does Angela Sinikas, and there are tons of texts and specialists out there who would be glad to help guide you.

One of the easiest ways is to isolate PR as the only marketing element applied on a project and that way you can take 100% credit for the outcome. Then there are the more sophisticated approaches such as marketing mix modeling and six sigma, both of which I personally am beginning to explore. The bottom line is you have to start because sooner or later if you haven't already, you will be required to do so and for the sake of the profession, let's all aim to be ready.

Or maybe I should ask are you ready? I'd be happy to hear your thoughts. Feel free to post a comment.