Research in the Real World

These days, public relations have a bad reputation. When you hear someone say “PR” maybe you think of BP or Toyota, with anger and frustration. Maybe you were offended by someone’s flippant response that they’d like their life back, while 11 workers had died and millions of gallons of oil spewed into the Gulf, robbing people of their livelihoods. Or maybe you see visions of a company that doesn’t seem to care that cars went flying off the roads due to (alleged, the jury is still out) faulty mechanics.


So why would anyone decide: “I want to go into PR”? Good question. As someone looking into a graduate program in Public Relations, this was a question I asked myself. While PR has its admittedly awful examples of bad PR, it’s the good PR that goes largely unnoticed and unappreciated. But the job of PR, actually, is to bring the voices and concerns of the publics – the employees, the consumers, the shareholders, etc. – to the attention of organization management. When the CEO’s and VP’s discuss the trajectory of the company, thanks to PR, they can do so with the concerns of involved stakeholders in mind. This is done with research and listening to those publics.

Public Relations, then, is really a social science. It is a science about listening to people and what they have to say about a company and about how an organization's decisions affect their lives. This communication is done through many avenues of social research, including survey, experiment, and social observation, to name a few. The goal is to improve the functioning of an organization to ensure its socially-responsible future. Lofty, right? I hope not.

As a student of this discipline, I am approaching this experience of graduate school with high expectations. I want to learn all about how to listen to people and present their best interests. This semester, I am participating in a Research Methods class, designed to explore valid and useful ways of conducting this research on organization stakeholders. I will be keeping this blog to document what I learn, as I learn it.

I have decided to approach this experience hypothetically, considering the topics as if I was an employee on the Communications team for the company Unilever. You’ve probably used a product by Unilever, even if you don’t know it. They make products under the labels Dove, Axe, Lipton, Hellman’s, Bertolli, Knorr, and many other familiar brands. The company makes these food, home care, and personal care products under the self-professed umbrella that their products "add vitality to life." This image, mission, and how the company relates to its publics (it’s PR, in other words) is something I will explore here, through the lens of social research. Thanks for reading! Check out Unilever’s website below.

Actually, to kick off this blog, I’d love if you would post your initial comments about the website below. We’ll call it the first steps in a rather unofficial research project… http://www.unilever.com/