COMM 150: Public relations, management and mission statements

Today, experts on public relations agree ... [w]hen ainstitutions are making policy, they need to consider the effects on their many publics. That can be done best when the person in charge of public relations, ideally at the vice presidential level, is intimately involved in decision-making. The public relations executive advises the rest of the institution's leaders on public perceptions and the effects that policy options might have on perceptions. Also, the public relations vice president is in a better position to implement the institution's policy for having been a part of developing it. - John Vivian, "Media of Mass Communication" (277).

One reason John Vivian - along with most people who write about public relations - insists that PR is a management function is that its strategy and tactics should reflect an organization's mission. To understand why, we need to review an important tool in organizational development that Vivian doesn't say much about - the organization's mission statement or "a statement of the purpose of a company or organization." The definition is from Wikipedia, which adds, "The mission statement should guide the actions of the organization, spell out its overall goal, provide a path, and guide decision-making." Wikipedia, as usual, is a pretty good starting place. Done right, a mission statement is at the core of its strategic thinking. It takes someone in top management to make sure the mission is followed through, and it takes a PR person in upper-level management to ensure the organization's public face is consistent with its mission.

Done wrong, a mission statement is a jumble of words and cutsey slogans. A lot of them are done wrong, and a lot of people are properly suspicious of mission statements. Which is one reason why it's important for PR professionals to do it right.

So here's a brief outline, and below that an exercise for you to do and post as a comment to this post.

Peter Drucker, who was probably the 20th century's most influential management consultant, once famously said "a mission statement should fit on a T-shirt. In an book called "Managing the Non-Profit Organization," Drucker put it like this:

The first thing to talk about is what missions work and what missions don't work, and how to define the mission. For the ultimate test is not the beauty of the mission statement. The ultimate test is right action.

The most common question asked me by non-profit executives is: What are the qualities of a leader? The question seems to assume that leadership is something you can learn in a charm school. But it also assumes that leadership by itself is enough, that it's an end. And that's misleadership. The leader who basically focuses on himself or herself is going to mislead. The three most charismatic leaders in this century inflicted more suffering on the human race than almost any trio in history: Hitler, Stalin, and Mao. What matters is not the leader's charisma. What matters is the leader's mission. Therefore, the first job of the leader is to think through and deflne the mission of the institution.

And he summed up what he had to say about mission statements with this:

A mission statement has to be operational, otherwise it's just good intentions. A mission statement has to focus on what the institution really tries to do and then do it so that everybody in the organization can say, This is my contribution to the goal.

A mission statement has to be operational: What does that mean? You've got to be able to translate it into action. In "Managing the Non-Profit Organization," Drucker gives a couple of examples. Here's one:

Here is a simple and mundane example-the mission statement of a hospital emergency room: "It's our mission to give assurance to the afflicted." That's simple and clear and direct. Or take the mission of the Girl Scouts of the U.S.A.: to help girls grow into proud, self-confident, and self-respecting young women. There is an Episcopal church on the East Coast which defines its mission as making Jesus the head of this church and its chief executive officer. Or the mission of the Salvation Army, which is to make citizens out of the rejected. Arnold of Rugby, the greatest English educator of the nineteenth century, who created the English public school, defined its mission as making gentlemen out of savages.

My favorite mission definition, however, is not that of a nonprofit institution, but of a business. It's a definition that changed Sears from a near-bankrupt, struggling mail-order house at the beginning of the [20th] century into the world's leading retailer within less than ten years: It's our mission to be the informed and responsible buyer-first for the American farmer, and later for the American family altogether.

Sears has lost sight of its mission in recent years, according to some business analysts. But for a long time, it was nothing if not a farmers' store. Farmers and their families ordered from the Sears catalog (which they also put to other uses), and they shopped at Sears when they came to town. I remember as a kid walking into the Sears in Knoxville, Tenn., and they were selling everything from baby chicks to metal washtubs to the kind of old-fashioned dark blue overalls that were so stiff you could stand them up in the corner until you'd washed them a dozen times. You'd smell the chicken feed as soon as you walked in the door, and you knew Sears was for farmers. Who are Sears' customers now? Well, there aren't that many them anymore. And I think lack of a clear mission is one reason why.

As usual, Wikipedia was a good starting point. And Drucker's explanation is a classic. But we need to go beyond Wikipedia and update Drucker. So here's the exercise:

Your assignment: Find something on the World Wide Web that clearly explains what a mission statement is and what it does.
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Please post what you find out as a comment to this blog. And be sure to include a Web address. Copy and paste it from the address field in your browser into your comment. Like this:

Business Resource Software of Austin, Texas, says, "A mission statement may look simple but it should communicate the core of your organization with a precise statement of purpose. Words should be chosen for meaning and clarity - not technical jargon." There's more. I like it. It's simple. It's clear. And it tells you what to do and how to do it. What's not to like about that?
http://www.brs-inc.com/news002.html