Last week, Deanne left a comment on PRGirlz asking some advice about landing PR gigs. I started to comment and then said to myself, “Self - this would make an excellent blog post next Monday”. Here I am.

And, let me stress, what is written below is just my opinion. There is a wonderful team of folks here at TFC that have different ideas about this process. It’s all good.

I wandered into PR in an unconventional fashion. In the early 90s, while at university in Montreal, I started my career in PR unwittingly as the mouthpiece external coordinator for the Sexual Assault Centre of McGill Students Society (SACOMSS). At the time, sexual assault was a really hot issue on campus and in downtown Montreal; I was one of the few English spokespeople on the subject in the city at the time. This meant that I had to deliver the SACOMMS message to a variety of stakeholder groups from students to McGill University’s administration to the local police. I managed to piss off people in all areas on the one hand. On the other hand, we raised our profile in a hurry, gaining the respect of survivors, the community and media.

My experience was unique, without doubt. That said, once I decided to become a PR practitioner, I had to find a way to package my skills and experience in a way that would be palatable to prospective employers. It’s harder that you would think.

I sit on the opposite side of the table nowadays and review CVs and conduct interviews for our group at TFC. I have some ideas about breaking in that I hope can come in handy.

• Consume the media. Yep. Buy into it hook, line and sinker. You need to know how media works and what reporters/ editors/ producers want. You should understand who owns what outlet and how that makes an impact on coverage. Read everything you can. Develop intelligent opinions about the reporters/ outlets. Understand the news process.
• Research your target audience. There are many PR agencies in Toronto, and to the uneducated, they may seem similar. The thing is, they aren’t. And, as an applicant, you should educate yourself about the firm as much as possible. If you want a job at TFC, for example, you should know a bit about what we do, who we are, and what it is that we do that is different. If the principals have blogs or podcasts, review them.
• Create an interesting portfolio. Honestly, I am impressed by people who travel, do volunteer work and can make a case for what it taught them, and why they are a better person for doing that work. In PR, you do everything from the mundane to the glamorous at all levels. Don’t be afraid to translate your experience in an interesting way to the PR world.
• Proofread your CV and cover letter. I am blown away by the number of resumes that we receive that have typos. I’d say that you should have a text version of your CV along with an RTF version on hand at all times, properly formatted.
• If you get a call for an interview, dress the part, act the part and be the part. Come with a list of questions beyond payscale and benefits. Make me understand why I should hire you.

All that said, we are looking for a coordinator to work with Michael O’Connor Clarke, me and our consumer/ tech/ entertainment team. If you think you’ve got the skills, then please email me at mmj at thornleyfallis dot com.

Welcome to the first instalment of Thursday’s From the Front Desk.

Please note! Due to the unpredictable nature of the PR world From the Front desk may occasionally be posted on a Friday, after-hours, from my father’s computer. Like today, for instance.

From the Front Desk is Samantha Lovelace’s spin on the PR world from a entry-level perspective.

As an entry-level PR-erson and, indeed, office worker, Samantha sits at the front desk of TFC.

During an average day she doesn’t just answer phones and fix printers; Samantha’s front desk experiences are just short of a full degree’s worth of education in PR, computers and people. This, along with general office antics keep her, and she hopes will keep you, entertained all workday long (and sometimes longer).

Now that being said, and with out further ado, Here’s Sammy!

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Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls - Welcome to the first ever post From the Front Desk!

I thought I’d take this opportunity to introduce myself:
My name is Samantha Lovelace and I work at the front desk at Thornley Fallis Communications.

I was lucky to have been introduced to the job, Alex Milroy, Sandra Cruickshanks and Michael O’Connor Clarke by my most fabulous friend, Ms. Lauren Saliba.

Lauren was “the front desk” at TFC in Ottawa and knew they were looking for “Lauren” in Toronto. After great consideration, she declined the offer to transfer herself and passed on the opportunity to me; a quickly tiring, server/bartender/manager of 8 odd years.

Lauren and I have been faithful friends for close to 14 years. We met, one fine evening, in the yard behind Muchmore public school in Ottawa’s “the Glebe”. I believe it was a Friday.

With a fresh squeezed BBA and a desire for something new I was eager to take on the new challenge and marched in to the Ottawa office for my first “career” interview.

I got the job!

With in the month I left the famed Royal Oak in the Glebe of Ottawa, trained a couple of days in Ottawa and packed up my things, my loving partner-in-crime and our cat. Off to Toronto we went.

It was three days before I experienced my first printer malfunction, learned how to do a mail merge, met my first client and worked past five in a 9-5 job. Lets just say I didn’t find my admin skills they were violently thrust upon me with the fury of one incredibly angry volcano.

I like to think, though I’ve hit many a nasty pot hole along the way, I’ve fared relatively well. Not only have I learned how to take care of normally adminy duties, but I took on some new roles too. Media monitoring, event support, ideation, podcast production and some fundamental accounting tasks are just a few of my weekly activities.

And now I can ad one more notch to my PR agency belt:
Almost a year later, well versed in computer malfunction, telephone manner, morning scans, excel spreadsheets, and with a couple of events under my belt, I am writing my first official post on PR Girlz. I can say, as I sit faithfully at the front desk of Thornley Fallis Communications, I finally feel like I am an official PR Grrril.

Thanks for stopping by. I look forward to sharing some front desk antics with you next week.

Until then, take care.

Samantha Lovelace

It occurred to me recently that I’ve never written about how I got into PR in the first place. Which is odd since it’s a question I hear almost as often as “and what IS PR?” So here’s my story: I, like most of the free world, didn’t know too much about PR. I knew I liked to write but that was about it. In my third year of university, a friend recommended me to work with her doing promotions. It was for a small marketing company in Leaside and involved going to 4 or 5 bars during the night and promoting a newly released film with games and giveaways. It wasn’t something I thought I’d be good at since I can be shy, but I really liked it and quickly shed my shell in favour of acting like a fool in a public place. 

The job was perfect since it was a few nights a month and fit in with my night owl lifestyle. I’ve never been a huge partier, but I was up, so why not get paid for it? We’d start out around 9:30, and go to our scheduled bars, finishing up around 1:30 or 2. The money was good and I got to know the bar scene in Toronto. 

From there, another friend and I got involved with a bigger marketing company. We’d do more product promotions than anything and I got to go to some fun events around the city. It was great since they’d call when they had a job and I could take it or turn it down, depending on my schedule. For every job, we’d have to go into the office for training; this involved them taking us through the same confidentiality agreements and telling us about the product we would be promoting. At one such training session, the PR and Marketing people for the product sat in. The product was toothpaste. The approach was giving out coupons at movie theatres. Brilliant? Not so much. About half way through I just knew it was going to be a disaster and hoped my bosses hadn’t set the client’s expectations to high. Who wants coupons at the movies? You want to give coupons, go to the drug store, the grocery store. Moms buy toothpaste; theatre goers aren’t so concerned with their dental health at that point.

By this point, I had learned about PR and what it involved. And I knew that if these airheads could do it, I certainly could. I became determined to get into the field so that I could fire those people and do their job better. So I set about figuring out how. I talked to people, worked for a summer at a writing and design firm, investigated and applied to Humber’s PR program and was accepted. And here I am. The rest, as they say, is history.

So now I want to know- how did you get into PR? What’s your story?

First off, I should disclose that I am technically I member of the 18-24 year old demographic, if only just. I turn 25 at the end of this month, so I’m on the edge. But despite being a part of this group, I am worlds away from those at the other end, even those just a mere 3-5 years younger than myself. Why am I spending so much time elaborating on this? Because a lot of attention is bestowed on this demographic. Television networks want them to watch their shows. Magazines want them to read their publications. Corporations want them to buy their products. They (we) are the prize.

Moreso than any other generation before them, these young adults have grown up along side of drastic technological change. I was in the sixth grade when we got our first home computer. All my high school papers had to be typed. My nephew, only 6 years my junior and at the opposite end of this demographic, has had a computer since he was five. He could build one with only minimal supervision by the age of 13. Everything in his life is done online. He is computer savvy, internet savvy and skeptical of everything around him. He is who corporations want on their side. He and his friends talk about the world on MySpace and MSN Messenger. If they like something or hate something, it’s posted online for the world to see.

Why do you care about my nephew? Well, because every business in the world, large and small, tell us that he is the future. But he doesn’t know how to research in a library. He doesn’t know that there are printed journals on every topic you can imagine sitting in Academic libraries across North America. So why are we trying to learn from him and change our world to suit him and his friends?

When Shel Israel came to town a couple weeks back, he talked about the 18-24 year olds. He told us that they are online, they blog and they will continue to do so once they enter the workforce. The companies that embrace social media and technology are the ones who will succeed in hiring the brightest and the best. And although this seems very logical, I can’t help but wonder why the rest of the world, the majority of the world for that matter, is being encouraged to bow and accommodate these kids. Shouldn’t they have to adapt to the world a little bit too? Change is good. Technology has allowed us to do things our grandparents couldn’t even imagine. I don’t dispute these things. I don’t dispute that the 18-24 year olds can bring something new and exciting and important to the world and the workforce. I just question the carte blanche they’re being given. Well then blog, so we have to let them if we want to keep them. Do we really? And how are we to know that they best, brightest, most influential people of that generation are online? Aren’t we maybe a little closed-minded to think that the best members of society blog about their life?

I’m a fairly new addition to the blogosphere and I do enjoy it. But I also remember that in university, you couldn’t use online sources. Why? Because there is no way to verify the authenticity of the information. I had to look it up in books. That isn’t going to change; it shouldn’t. Those 18-24 year olds are going to have to learn that and I’m willing to bet that they won’t like or understand it. And do you really want to hire someone who has blogged since they were 10 but doesn’t know how to search archival journals? Doesn’t know where to go to do actual, physical research? Do you want someone who can only write with spellcheck and uses expressions like “lol, brb, l8tr?” If that’s enough for you, you’ll be happy with what you get. But I’ll bet that the companies that are going to thrive in years to come are the ones that look beyond social media and the World Wide Web to find the brightest and the best. And the North Americal 18-24 year olds might not cut it in the long run. They might one day rule the world. But is it going to a world you’re proud to be a part of? Will you even recognize it?

One more thing. Yes, it’s quite cool that you can have conversations with people online and through blogs who are half a world away. But you’ll never meet them. Yes, these 18-24 year olds are well connected with friends in Mexico, Australia, Sweden, China. But can they relate to people? Can they socialize without a computer and a keyboard? Isn’t the price of actual human relationships just a little too costly to waste?

So, I’m back in the T dot after a couple weeks in the homeland. Been busy - ate some toutons, spied some puffins, drank on George, rode the waves, sang with my sisters, got kissed by a sailor and, oh yeah, got married. I will put my hand up and readily admit I’ve been partying with family and friends, blithely ignoring all online nonsense and shenanigans, and now feel mild, maybe semi-mild, pressure to write something profound to mark my return. Thus, I’ll do what most bloggers do, i.e. cast about to find something someone else has said, glom on to it and add my worthless two cents.

So, my current boss and my former boss, on their ever-popular podcast, have been discussing networking. More specifically, they’ve been discussing their top hints and tips on how to network. Basically (to crib shameless from their show notes) Terry said that his most powerful networking tip is to be yourself and worry about building the relationship, not selling services. David said you should always stay in touch and provide some value so people see you as someone who can help them out.

In principle, I don’t disagree with either of these tips. My problem (and I always seem to have a problem, don’t I?) is that by calling it “networking”, we give the impression that it’s an actual skill or tool that must be (and can be) acquired and applied. Like desktop publishing or speaking French. Or, in this instance, like writing a press release. I blame college profs and biz/self-help authors for starting this.

You can try to make it sound fancier and apply all the business babble jargon to it, but “networking” is no more than being interesting and engaging people. All people, any people. That’s it. Networking = being personable. (Students, save the $20 you were going to spend buying this and go chat someone up at the pub. It will be more useful.)

We all have, at one point or another, been approached by someone who has read one too many checklists on “How to Network.” The greasy grin and crunching handshake, the studied manner of nodding and smiling, the practiced questions about “So, what do you do?”, the ability to get a business card into your hand from 30 feet away. It’s gross, it turns people off.

The ability to engage people is innate, I think - some people have a natural rapport with others, some people don’t. Those who don’t, armed to the teeth with networking advice, just annoy people at cocktail parties and do themselves more harm than good in their career. If being engaging and personable doesn’t come naturally, all the books on Amazon won’t help. If that’s the case, your best bet is to do damn good work and align yourself with someone who can sing your praises. After all, you can network your pants off, but if your work isn’t good you’ll be well-known for all the wrong reasons. (Overheard at an IABC event: “Quick, let’s go. That boring/awkward/weird guy is on his way over. Hey, by the way, did you hear he just lost the XX account?”)

There’s been a lot of chatter around our place about a posting by our colleague Chris Clarke. For me this is really about the tortuous route we all face as we join the working world. It’s unfortunate but this is not a subject that is easy to include in a course curriculum because it’s about a lot of intangibles such as personalities or cultural backgrounds. However it is a certainty that regardless of where we work or the work we do we must know and demonstrate appropriate business behaviours AND appreciate that every organization small or large has its own way of doing things — the corporate culture.

Learning what the expectations are within any organization can be more difficult for some than others. We all come with skills which allow us to be successful but just being really good at something won’t guarantee our success in business. Understanding culture requires us to observe and participate in it. In the course of our careers we face difficult relationships with co-workers, bosses, clients, board members, stakeholders, you name it. Common sense, respect, tongue-biting, the occasional brown-nosing comment and, yes, sometimes biting the bullet to be more polite than the situation or individual might in fact deserve go a long way in building good relationships.

And I have to say that I worry that the some of the students (not just in PR!) I’ve spoken with don’t seem to understand this is a constant give and take. Somewhere along the way, some seem to have come to the belief that give and take is a sign of weakness or something, not a way to do business. Finding our “place” starts with an understanding that each and every one of us must pay our dues along the way — and in paying our dues we are learning more about ourselves, our clients, our colleagues and our company. Those of us who understand this have an obligation to encourage, support and mentor others so that they to can be successful. Don’t get me wrong here, I’m not talking about being wishy washy and I firmly believe we must be true to ourselves and our personal beliefs. So I guess that’s the challenge, adapting to the business world while holding on to who we are as people.