Each week I seem to have a new understanding of who PR people are, what they do, and how they do it. For a while now I have thought that the best PR professionals are the ones that studied hard on and have GOST outlines dancing around in their heads ready for use at any second.
Recently, however, I have learned a very valuable lesson about the PR world. I learned that, while the technical skills can be useful and important, they do not necessarily make a successful PR professional.
Through careful contemplation and observation I have summed up a truly successful PR professional in three traits…
1.Passionate
Successful PR professionals are first and foremost passionate about what they do. There are so many different avenues of PR and if someone wants to be the best that they can be at what they are doing, then they must work in a sector that they are passionate about. When this magic happens everyone around can tell. The ideas are more fresh and the language they use is sparked with the passion that they have to share.
2.Strategic
Strategy is something that the best PR professionals have in their skill set. They take the situation and make the best of it. They know what it is that they need to communicate and they know exactly who they should be communicating it to. This means that they are thorough in their research and preparation for the job at hand.
3.Confident
People who are confident do not need to be specifically skilled in PR, but their confidence always seems to shine through. The confidence is important to have in a job like PR when there is so much uncertainty. A successful professional takes what they know and rolls with it in a way that puts everyone else at ease.
Passionate. Strategic. Confident.
That is what we should all strive to be as PR professionals in order to be truly successful in a meaningful and fulfilling way.
By Helen Berdebes, Junior Account Executive, KC-CASA
