I’ve often wondered what you all say you do, when someone asks you in real life, perhaps over dinner. A FGS employee might say they are a "strategic advisor for the stakeholder economy", while a Brunswick star might describe it as "helping clients play their role in the world more successfully". 

It’s unfair to only talk about competitors' employees, as Lansons is now part of Team Farner...but we don't tell our parents that we are “management consultants on integrated communications”. Our industry now uses more words to describe what we do than ever before and it seems to be working. 

Industry change

Earlier this year, Sunday Times business editor Oliver Shah wrote that our industry’s transformation “from cottage industry to sophisticated global business over the past three decades has been remarkable”, going on to cite the size of private equity investment in Brunswick, FGS and Teneo as proof. But he also called our industry PR, the one descriptor that us on the corporate advisory side of the business desperately try to avoid.

Our terror at being labelled PR is understandable, because PR is a commodity. When PR professionals appear on screen they’re either malicious or trivial, or both; think Samantha Jones in Sex and the City, or Olivia Pope in Scandal. 

As a verb, “to PR” something is shallow, as a job descriptor a PR can never be senior anywhere except in a PR agency. So we strive for more, because we’re better than that. However we can never entirely escape the words public relations. I’m writing in PRmoment, and If I worked in India I’d belong to the PRSI. I’ve given countless hours of my time to the PRCA, and many of my clients call me a PR adviser. As Eminem said, back in 2000, “I am whatever you say I am. And if I wasn’t then why would you say I am”. So it is with us and PR.

Taking the path of least resistance

I’ve no intention of going gently into the good night, but I am at peace with the term public relations. In 2018 I wrote a book proclaiming that reputation management was the future of corporate communications and public relations. Six years on, I’m not so sure, although I’m more convinced than ever that building and protection reputation is the most valuable thing we all do. However the term “reputation management” now conjures images of digital dark arts or legions of lawyers working for bad people. Meet me in real life, and I will say I help manage reputations and I’ll probably throw public relations in there somewhere, it is easier, after all. But, professionally I’ve moved on a bit.

As corporate advisers we’re highly paid and want to be more so. To do this we must make a significant difference at key moments in our clients’ world. There’s not a lucrative future in “business as usual” or in situations where the solution is formulaic or obvious. What the best corporate advisers in our industry excel at, is advising on special situations. So over dinner, if you’re still awake after I’ve gone through helping manage reputations and public relations, I’ll tell you I advise businesses, leaders, organisations and countries on special situations. 

I’d love to know what you say you do.