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"Believe in the power of ‘NOW’ with an unadulterated faith and confidence in your abilities" - Shrutidhar Paliwal

2015-03-07T02:26:00.000-08:00

Shrutidhar Paliwal

Shrutidhar Paliwal (41), Corporate Communication and Branding professional at Mumbai has more than 17 years of experience in communication field. After his graduation in Tourism, he developed a passion for PR and Communication. Presently, he is the Vice President heading the Communication Department of Aptech. In a freewheeling interview with Prime Point Srinivasan, he shares his on various aspects of communication practised in India, attitude of youth, his role model, etc.

Excerpts:

Can you share in brief your early days of schooling and college?

For the formative first couple of years of formal education I studied at Hyderabad, since my father was pursuing a research project in the city. Post class four, we moved to Jaipur, where I studied at St Xavier School, a time well spent in discipline & learning that I imbibed for good. Graduated in Arts from the University of Rajasthan, Jaipur and went to pursue post-graduation at the Department of Management Studies in Jodhpur. Never a very brilliant student, I was at the football ground, or the cricket pitch or even the school/college canteen, meeting friends, making new ones and generally having a good time. The belief in sharing, caring and respect for every individual comes from a happy childhood for which I always thank my mother.

After graduating yourself in 'tourism', what prompted you to enter into PR field?

Tourism or Service Marketing happened with a stroke of luck. The Tourism Action Plan of the GOI in 1992 mandated a few universities to initiate a two year post graduate degree in Tourism Administration studies, to create administrators for the spread and growth of Tourism in India. The course shared a common teaching path with the regular management course, but dealt with Tourism and Service Marketing issues in specific semesters.

An interest in Western Rajasthan, travel, heritage, architecture and the economics of tourism led me to join the course. It was more fun than conventional learning, of which I am a huge advocate and practice till date.

I realized only later that PR is what I have always practiced-even as a student, leading teams at events, conflict resolution during college days, or hosting events for corporate & media at the PG level; and I believed it would be a natural progression for me to be a part of this industry. To hone my skills, I pursued a one year Diploma from the Bhartiya Vidhya Bhawan, during which I wrote for a few publications.

You have worked in different industries and also international companies. What do you find the difference in the PR strategies between Indian companies and international companies?

The major difference comes in Planning, Budgets, Relevance and Importance devoted to PR strategies and execution.

PR, is still the poorer cousin to marketing in an Indian corporate context with little budgets and sometimes lack of understanding on the subject. The blame really is, in part, to the earlier promoter driven corporates who assigned their key ‘babu’ to liaise with the media or the administration and termed them Public Relation Officers. These PRO’s were used only for crisis management or to communicate with shareholders through one or few published journal in a year.

International companies, by virtue of cross cultural, work in different demography’s and sheer multi-national exposure, always want their eyes and ears to reality. They are where the action is and thus the Communication officer was like an ambassador to the local unit/project. Details of operations, manpower, finance & local potential are always shared with the Communication officer to make her hands on, and provide answers if and when questioned by internal stakeholders, shareholders, administration or the media.

How PR Can be used to uplift the poor and downtrodden in the Indian context?

A large part of the work carried out by PR practioners is to present a strong readable, watchable, overview of the key problem/issue, as also provide vital, workable solutions. The same skills that drive a company’s information flow to great heights can be used to highlight the problems faced by millions of homeless & hungry. An example of it is shoddy communication material prepared by a well-known NGO, doing great work in the Indian Sub-continent and yet not able to bridge the trust deficit around NGO’s. I fundamentally believe in outstanding work well aided by great communication effort and here PR can be used to uplift the downtrodden.

Many international companies spend lot of money in the 're-branding' exercise. Do you think 're-positioning' like innovation of products and services can help Indian companies to attract more customers in a cost effective manner?

Rebranding is a natural process to fight brand-fatigue, and to enable the brand to look contemporary, with the times and ‘fresh’. Not just international companies, Indian corporates have also reaped tremendous benefits of a rebranding exercise.

Innovation of products and services to suit changing lifestyle, consumption patterns and varied tastes in a large diversified country such as India, is a must. Re-positioning is not necessarily just the packaging, but a change in product, service, ethos, value proposition and philosophy of the marketeer towards a rapidly evolving customer.

Can you share one of your great disappointments / failures in the PR experience. What lesson you learnt out of your failure?

During the launch of a large tie-up and subsequent announcement in New Delhi, I accompanied the top management to the venue. The communication officer of the institution had assured me that for the press conference over 50 friends from the media were confirmed. Thus, I did not do my exercise (invite media, do follow ups, ensure participation, arrange logistics etc) and completely relied on him. In another largely unconnected but notable event, a political fracas had happened in New Delhi, and all the journalists were pressed from different beats to cover this political crisis of sorts. I remember being in this very important press conference with only two journalists attending it. Of course I was embarrassed for not doing my exercise well enough and very angry at relying completely on the host. If I had done the due diligence of the most important events in the day or that week in New Delhi, I would, in all probability have postponed the press meet or made the announcement in Mumbai.

Can you share one of the great achievements in your PR career?

Launching the re-branded version of an almost three decade old company, taking the brand promise to internal & external customers and helping each unleash their potential tops my list of achievements. The Re-branding blitz, largely digital marketing driven, was covered very well by national & international press and was adjudged a huge success.

What is your vision for the next 10 years?

In a fast changing socio-economic landscape and the ever increasing reliance on and spread of social media, brands and companies need to be cautious with their information and flow, tread positively but with guarded optimism. My vision stems and picks cue from these facts and I plan to ensure that I make a positive contribution to the well-being, growth and spread of the brand/company I am associated with.

Nowadays, I find that many new entrants in the PR or any communication field do not show much interest in updating their knowledge and skills. Many of them lack vision in their career. They seem to be aiming only at money. How to motivate the youth to focus on the career development in the interest of the nation.?

It is a scary and twisted mindset that with just a small six month course, or a six month employment one is entitled to be a PR or communication professional. Genuine up gradation of skills and knowledge, across the sector and interest area is the need of the hour. There are hundreds of short courses, online and offline both, which are available today. Read classics, develop a genuine interest in reading, develop good yet simple-writing skills, and strive to be a good conversationalist, always lens your idea to how good can it be communicated, build and give time to assimilate information, cultivate sources and learn from stalwarts within the industry.

I have also believed that making money is good, but doing better work is better and courageous.

Each of us can make a positive contribution to the country by doing the best we can in any field. The youth also need to focus on hard work as against the management wizardry (which comes after having spent a good time in one company) of smart work, where unfortunately one department works very smart and stays ignorant of other department work. Team Work, unity of thought and India-first as a philosophy needs to be cultivated.

What is your single message to your colleagues in the PR and Communication industry?

It is good to be a Megaphone. But it is better to be a Megaphone with a conscious.

Meet often. We all know how stressful the life of a communication professional is. It is imperative that all of us meet often and share. It is in the interest of this small community that we pursue a board seat for a Head of Communications across the industry. More than any other function such as sales, finance or accounts, the role of the head of communication will be important for the brand and company’s overall health-both perceived and real. Unless we see ourselves as the change agent in a rapidly changing, social media savvy customer-consumer of products, services and our communication, nothing much will change.

Who is role model in your life? How he/she inspired you? What you learnt from him/her?

I do not have a role model really, but there are some people I follow and get inspired with for their depth of understanding, narrating stories, writing brilliance and general life skills.

One of them is a friend, philosopher and guide-Ajay Chopra, who runs Crayons Advertising and is the Chairman of the Dharam Sajjan Trust, which works for women empowerment, poverty alleviation and conservation of art, craft, literature and poetry. He inspires me to be SIMPLE. Simplicity, such as his, is unfound and indeed a great motivation.

Another one I follow is a friend Sumantra Sen, an author, finance professional and now heads a large developmental, change maker institution. His work on water conservation, climate change and other ideas are followed across the world and I am deeply inspired with him and his work.

I also follow the work of my better half Arpita Mehta, who after having graduated in Math Honours from one of the country’s most premium college Lady Shriram in New delhi, had the passion and guts to follow her dream to become a garment designer and later shift to becoming a professional Menu Designer. Honestly, I never thought there was a field such a Menu Design.

All of it teaches me to believe in the power of ‘NOW’ and carry an unadulterated faith and confidence in one’s abilities, something that I believe is important to be very successful.

Shrutidhar Paliwal can be reached at shrutidhar@yahoo.com

"hurdles or mishaps are happening for a reason" - Amith Prabhu

2015-01-24T22:34:00.003-08:00

Amith Prabhu (34), a committed PR and Communication professional of India has been silently creating PR awareness by bringing them together and honouring the young achievers. He has created a platform PRAXIS for Global PR practitioners to come together to share their knowledge and grow together. He organizes this summit every year in various parts of the country and has recently concluded the 3rd summit in Agra. He was also recently awarded with the recognition of "PR professional of the year' at the Exchange4Media's Indian PR and Corporate Communications Award 2014.

On behalf of the Indian PR online groups (prpoint group, Indian PR forum, GFPR group), Prime Point Srinivasan, interviewed Amit Prabhu through email. Excerpts.

Recently you got an award from e4m. Why this award was given?

The e4m Group has an external jury who goes through various nominations. I am told that I was nominated for having led the initiative to bring the PR fraternity together by organising PRAXIS for three years in a row and counting.

Any other awards you have received earlier. Details.

I have never participated in awards proactively. Most awards I have won were at my first job and these were internal for campaigns we had worked on. The company also awarded one employee as the Soul of the company for embodying its values and I was the youngest winner of that award in 2007

Can you say some thing about your pre-profession days. schooling, college, qualification, etc.

I was born and raised in Mangalore where I spent the first 21 years of my life. My parents were both in the teaching profession but never pressurised me to get into lucrative careers. I had a liberal upbringing. I spent 12 years in a Jesuit school followed by an under-graduation in law. I then spent a year travelling around the country promoting the International Year of Volunteers in 2001. Then in 2002 I pursued a full-time Masters Degree in communication Management specialising in Public relations from Symbiosis Pune

What prompted you to enter PR profession. Was there any specific incident that made you to enter this field.

I always dreamt of a job that had a mix of sitting in a office and travelling. TV commercials and Writing always fascinated me and I thought I would get into either journalism or advertising so I decided to apply to Symbiosis in order to get a formal qualification. At the interview the then Director felt I was better suited for a career in PR and suggested I change my choice of stream in my application if I wanted to have a better shot at admission. Having not applied elsewhere I thought this was my only hope at getting admission. I thought I could change my specialisation if I did not enjoy PR but that was not to be.

Can you say something about your PR career?

During my under-graduation days I dabbled into media relations in my home town of Mangalore for couple of organisations and individuals. I enjoyed talking to journalists at the age of 18 and 19. I was also elected the national spokesperson of a youth organisation when I was barely 20. My formal career began with a job offer on campus from Genesis Public Relations which was launching its pioneering Associate Learning Programme. I was one of the first to sign a three year contract which the firm had introduced in 2004. I worked in three of its offices working on some iconic consumer brands. I was veering towards political communication and when APCO Worldwide was setting up in India I was hired as its first employee in Mumbai. The excitement of working with a start up which was over 20 years in the USA pulled me towards it. I then got an opportunity to set-up and lead communications for a media planning and buying company, which is when I joined Starcom MediaVest Group. I got lucky when I used social media to connect with the head of Edelman's Chicago office who instantly offered me a job to work in their founding office where I spent two fabulous years. I now run my own super specialty firm that focuses on getting national politicians to embrace the power of communications. It is called Zero Hour Strategies and in less than 6 months there have been couple of firms which have offered to buy it.

What is PRAXIS?

PRAXIS is the name of the national public relations and corporate communications summit that was born during a conversation with two other friends on the internet in early 2011. It was created because a strong need was felt to have a forum which celebrates the profession by bringing together professionals for a weekend of learning and fun. The first edition was held in Pondicherry in November 2012 followed by one in September 2013 in Lavasa and in September 2014 in Agra.

On what basis, you chose the awardees?

We give away two awards and one scholarship. The awards are given to professionals under the age of 30 - one each form in-house and from a PR consultancy. The scholarship is given to a student of Public Relations who is pursuing post-graduate studies. An independent jury chooses the awardees every year through a set of simple selection parameter.

You have mentioned about zero hour training for Parliamentarians. What is it?

Zero Hour Strategies is a firm I set up earlier this year to offer members of Parliament free communications and reputation management counselling. It is a firm which has Public Relations and Research at its core and also offers services in digital, outdoor and creativity with alliances that it has with other enterprises.

One single achievement in your career which you cherish till date.

My transfer from Bangalore to Mumbai when I was in the third year of my career was necessitated because a client was shifting headquarters. The client insisted that I be transferred to help transition this business better. When my CEO called me to say I was being transferred it was a proud moment. There have been others as well. But this one is always top on the list.

One great disappointment in your career. What is the lesson that you learnt out of this disappointment or failure?

I have never had disappointments in my life and in my career because I look at hurdles or mishaps as plans that are happening for a reason. Most things I set out to do have shaped the way I wanted them to be. I would be happiest the day we stop calling our professional community an industry and the day we stop referring to PR firms as agencies.

Amith Prabhu can be reached at amithpr@gmail.com

"Creating Public Relations awareness helps to enhance the image of the nation" - Richa Seth

2014-10-18T01:58:00.000-07:00

Richa Seth working as Senior Accounts Manager at Adfactors PR, one of the leading Indian PR Agencies was recently honoured with ‘Ace Business Communicator’ (ABC) Award for excellence in PR among the young Indian PR professionals. She is one of the active members of ‘prpoint’ group moderated by me. She is passionate about ‘Public Relations profession’ and always explores how the PR concept can help to develop the image of the Indian industry across the globe. In a freewheeling email interview with me, Richa Seth explained her passion, her goal, achievements, disappointments, etc. Excerpts:

Congratulations Richa for getting the PR Award at this young age. What is the significance of this award? What is your feeling now?

Last month (Sep 2014), I received the prestigious ‘Ace Business Communicator (ABC) Award 2014’ during PRAXiS summit in the presence of senior PR and Corporate Communication professionals of our country. It is a great morale booster for my career.

Such recognition makes a lot of difference for mid-level practitioners like us, where we are constantly battling client, team and media expectations. Recognition of this kind helps you to be reassured about the choice you have made. There are enough platforms for senior level practitioners. Since, only a few such opportunities are available for professionals at our level, such awards will motivate us not only do more for the companies we work but also contribute back to the profession and to the nation indirectly.

How many years of experience you have in public relations field? Why did you chose PR as your career? Any specific incident that led you to take this decision

I have over 7 years of pure play PR experience. It is quite interesting to know that I landed up in PR industry without any clue. As a person born and brought up in Mumbai, during my childhood days, I wanted to become an ‘Air Hostess’.

During my school and college days, I used to enjoy writing, organizing events. Unknowingly I was also involved in doing some PR for our college events. We used to meet a lot of journalists, invite them to be a part of our events and work with them to build stories around our events, but never thought that I will continue to do it as a full time profession.

After completing my graduation in 2007, when all my peers chose to pursue higher studies or profession, I had no clue what I wanted to do. Coincidentally when I met a senior batch mate of my college who was already pursuing a career in PR, she suggested me to go for an interview with Adfactors PR as they were looking at hiring some freshers. Without thinking much, I opted to go for an interview with the Managing Director, who till date interviews each and every candidate across all levels. Neither was I prepared for the interview nor did I do any background reading on what PR agencies actually did. Surprisingly I was not scared or nervous.

The Managing Director didn’t ask me much about the profession except a few questions PR books which I read. The answer was obviously negative. It was a Friday and he asked me when I would like to join. With all excitement, I told him that I wanted to join immediately on the same day. He smiled and asked me to join on the next Monday. He advised me that I should join a professional course on PR and read some books on PR.

I joined Adfactors PR in 2007 and completed a course in PR & Advertising at K.C. College and began my new journey into the unknown but elating. In 2009 I joined Masters Degree in Mass Communication with a Specialization in PR from Sikkim Manipal University through distance learning and completed it in 2012. In December 2011, I joined Edelman, another leading PR Agency. In December 2013, I returned to Adfactors PR.

What is your vision in PR career? What steps are you taking to achieve your mission and vision?

During my 7 years of experience in PR profession, I had the opportunity of handling important clients and challenging situations. I consider every challenge as an opportunity for me to learn. Though Indian Industry is doing good, they do not have sufficient ‘PR awareness’ and hence they are not able to project their image globally in the competitive environment.

My vision is to make an important contribution to society through effective communication and building reputation of corporates and associations. My mission is to showcase the value of effective communications (PR) to the CXO community across organizations and get a place at the boardroom discussions. Ultimately, this will help to project the nation also.

I am constantly trying to upgrade my knowledge and skills to perform better than before. I proactively put myself through challenging mandates and enjoy the thrill of a turning around a

sour relationship. Rather than working for large clients and set mandates, I love to seek an opportunity to work for startups and unknown brands. Reading has now become a habit, after understanding and doing considerable amount of reading about PR, I am now focusing more on broader marketing and strategic business development, human behavior and broader socio –economic developments.

I want to learn everything about India and its vast cultural diversities. I am actually on a long and very exciting journey, exploring new ideas, new thoughts and new thinking. I don’t know whether I will be a CEO or a leading Corporate Communicator but I am sure that it will be make me one of the best professionals in the country.

Apart from that I am also an avid blogger on PR & Social Media, introduced a weekly column PRQuest on www.vikypedia.in a popular PR blog and have my own blog too: www.richaseth.com. Keeping up with this mission, I also give guest lectures at various institutes on PR and Communication topics. I help to organize short PR workshops and meet-ups for industry youngsters.

I also initiate discussions about macro environment impacting the business of reputation management, share insights through knowledge nuggets about media, PR and more on online discussion groups such as prpoint group, Indian PR Forum & Media Forum. I am one of the moderators of Indian PR Forum.

I have seen many ladies with high level of PR passion drop out from the industry due to many reasons, including the family reasons. PR industry has lost many women professionals in the midway. Will you sustain the PR passion and continue your career for long time. How do you feel that we can retain these passionate women professionals in the industry?

You are absolutely right many successful women PR practitioners slow down their career progression mid-way as they take a break during marriage, essentially to give priority to their family. Sometimes they come back albeit with the same vigor and they take a back seat in their career. This happens often as she is not the real bread earner in most Indian families and needs to give more time to being a homemaker. On an average a women who wants to come back loses 6 months to 2 years of an important phase of work life, pushing them slightly behind in meeting their career goals. And as Indra Nooyi, CEO of Pepsi very rightly said, “I don’t think women can have it all. I just don’t think so. We pretend we have it all. We pretend we can have it all.”

As far as I am concerned, I am currently at the same crossroads as most women in the late 20’s

who are under societal and family pressure to get hitched. However educated ,the attitude of our society still remains unchanged. I get to hear, “Why are you running behind your career, you are a woman and will need to sacrifice/comprise/adjust your life for your husband and family.”

All said and done, I am not sure how much time I have left to get married but rest assured that whatever time I have in hand, I completely want to dedicate it to my learning, enhancing my knowledge about the communications industry and most importantly want to give back to the fraternity and to the society in whatever way I can. I will do my best to share my learning’s and mentor as many budding professionals in the industry. I endeavor to write a book that will share insights on Practical PR for budding professionals who aim to join the industry.

I believe that the PR industry can encourage women professionals by introducing flexi-work timings and work from home that can be monitored through stringent processes.

Generally, I find that many people joining PR industry take less interest in updating the knowledge. Why this phenomena? There are enough mentors in the industry. But no takers. Sustainability of interest is lacking. I want your views on this. How to improve the situation?

It is a very subjective situation as many youngsters who join the industry are often not mentored by their seniors about the role of a PR practitioner and immediately put on job to updating media lists and doing press release follow ups. Senior professionals do not dedicate enough time in training the youngsters about the nuances of the day-to-day work. They are sometimes not even involved in strategy planning meetings and in fact in some cases are not introduced to the clients as well. This is one of the reasons why youngsters lose interest in this profession.

This situation can be improved if the immediate seniors judge the capabilities of their team members and advise them about external courses as well that they can take up to become trained for the industry. PR consultancies should also organize training programs customized for people across all levels. The youth today is looking for ‘What is in it for me’, hence equipping them with technical knowledge and motivation from seniors will encourage them to be an active participant in this industry.

Do you cherish any specific achievement during your PR career?

I would like to share an example of a brand by a start-up company that was solely built through a PR campaign, launch of a consumer product. We crafted the campaign in such a way that it was not just about a product launch, but about stalwartly placing India on the map of global innovators. The brand today has secured global recognition in the media such as Wall Street Journal, New York Post, etc., and in India there is hardly any media that has not covered it yet. Today without spending a rupee on advertising or direct marketing the brand has been able to receive over 50,000 pre-orders from individuals, funding from angel investors and partnership offers from global consumer technology brands.

Any specific incident that caused you disappointment. The lesson learnt out of the disappointment.

It was almost 6 months in my new job, by then most of us start thinking that we know everything in PR and even I was overflowing with confidence and the 'know it all attitude'. It was the last week of December and most of my senior colleagues were on leave as we do not expect major client activities in that season. But all of a sudden an email landed up from our client requesting us to arrange for a press conference as they had signed a major deal and it was important for them to announce it immediately before the news became stale. Panic struck my senior and they were in a dilemma to take the press conference forward as only few junior executives were manning the office.

I pretty confidently offered to manage the press conference and without much choice all of them agreed. Without wasting much time I got on to the job, drafted a media invite and shot it off to all the media I knew could come to cover the event. Sent out SMS’ and even tried to follow-up, some gave a typical response “someone will come” – I wrote a status as “confirmed”, some said – “will try” – I wrote “tentative” in my status sheet and some yelled – “I am vacationing” and banged the phone on me. On the D-Day, the press conference was scheduled to start at 12.00 Noon and I reached late at about 11.45 am with one of my colleagues, expecting to find the client fuming. The wait started – 12.00 Noon – 12.15pm – 12.30 – 12.45 – only 4 guys turned up not because my invite had convinced them but because they got to know somehow that – here is the place that can offer them free lunch. It was a disaster, client left without saying a word. I didn’t understand whether to go back to office or leave the job. I called my senior who patiently listened and told me to relax as well as introspect and promised he will talk to the client and try to handle the situation.

My learning’s –

1) It was a holiday season – most journalists were out on vacation

2) I did not confirm from any source, validity of media list I was working on – most of the journalists either had changed their jobs or left journalism for good and one was no more

3) I should have asked for help, I was not aware about the tricks of the trade, someone more experienced than me could have helped to salvage the situation

4) I should have discussed with the client and could have tried to keep the client’s expectations low

Who is your role model in life and the profession? Why?

In life my role model is my mother, who is a homemaker but has inspired me to be hardworking, sincere and persistent; these attributes form the fundamentals of my personal and professional life. In the professional role, there are many role models to look upto such as, Chanda Kochhar, CEO of ICICI Bank under whose stewardship the bank has grown phenomenally. I also admire the courage and persistence of Indra Nooyi, CEO, Pepsi Co to strive and make a mark across the globe.

With your passion for PR, how do you want to serve the society as your 'Individual social responsibility', beyond serving the clients?

On the professional side, I am trying to create PR awareness among various industry people and also try to develop good professionals for the industry. PR is needed to project the nation in the competitive environment. On the personal side, I want to teach basics of English to the under privileged children studying in Municipal schools.

I teach PR and I am a guest lecturer at various institutes in Mumbai, I encourage youngsters to join the PR industry by sharing with them the opportunities and exposure they will get from this field. Additionally, I am a moderator of Indian PR Forum and an active participant of discussions about macro environment impacting the business of reputation management, share insights through knowledge nuggets about media. The NGO with which, I was associated earlier dropped this project. Now, I am looking for another NGO to help the under privileged children.

Thanks Richa for your responses. I wish you more laurels.

Richa Seth can be reached at richa.seth30@gmail.com Interviewed by Prime Point Srinivasan through email

Vikram Kharvi - Journalist turned PR professional

2009-04-30T02:05:00.000-07:00

Public Relations (PR) industry has started growing in the past one decade enormously. Many educational institutions have started separate courses on PR to prepare the students for this industry. Many educated youngsters join this industry with fat salary. PR is no longer 'Media centric'. The clients expect to get 360 degree brand image, to face the global competition.

The curriculum in the educational institutions do not match with industry needs. The youngsters who come out with book knowledge, need to get integrated with the industry. This could be possible only through continuous updating and learning process.

Do the young professionals take initiative in updating their knowledge and skills? Do the young professionals have a right attitude to connect to the industry? Even when the opportunity is provided, how do they utilise this to their advantage? To what extent senior professionals in the industry take interest in grooming the seniors? Is the learning aligned to the right practices? Do the professionals share the case studies with fellow professionals?

With these questions, we contacted Mr Vikram Kharvi, a Mumbai based young journalist turned PR professional over phone for an exclusive interview. Mr Vikram Kharvi is moderating a discussion group on PR for the past one year and also publishes a PR newsletter from this month. He is one of the few young professionals, who take lot of interest in developing the profession.

Please listen to his free and frank views, by clicking 'play' button in the flash player. (The audio streaming will be smooth in broadband connections. If the streaming is not smooth, please right click this link and save the link/target to your desktop in mp3 format and listen)

This audio podcast may also be listened from the following links
Podbazaar
Odeo

Jhon Arokiaswamy - Corpcom to PR Agency

2008-09-16T04:11:00.000-07:00

Whenever any student of PR from the City Colleges approach me for their intern, the first name that comes to my mind is always “Jhon Arokiasamy”, popularly known as Jhon, presently heading the operations of Good Relations at Chennai and Hyderabad. He has a passion for teaching and training the youngsters. Nearly 20 of his trainees are well placed in the industry across the country.

Hailing from a middle class family in a remote village of Andhra Pradesh, he had schooling near Chennai. He was a state level topper in Computer Science in Higher Secondary Education. After completing his Post Graduation in English Literature, he pursued MBA, specializing in HR and Systems.

His knowledge and skill in Literature and Computer Systems helped him in 1998 to start his career as a technical writer and then move on to Corporate Communication function in a software company.

There is always a trend that people working in the PR Agencies like to shift to Corpcom jobs at the earliest opportunity. They perceive Corpcom provides a better package with less of field work. Jhon, after a stint of three years in a lucrative corpcom job, preferred to shift to a PR Agency to develop his strategic and implementation skills.

“As a Corporate Communications professional, I always had a feeling that I had no option than just to agree with the CEO on all occasions. That’s why I realized that I should try being an external consultant. I thought working with a PR agency of repute would help me to learn more. I joined Perfection Relations.”, says Jhon proudly.

In these days, when the PR Agencies find it difficult to retain the customers for more than six months to one year, he is able to retain his customers against all the competition ranging from 2 years to 4 years.

Rashmi Sridharan, (presently a PR executive at Bangalore) who worked with him both as an intern and again as an employee for nearly 8 months says, “ Even as a student, I learnt lot of strategic communication from Jhon. He used to explain to us patiently like a teacher. He used to take the juniors also for pitching the account and for every meeting. He never promises deliverables, which are not feasible. When some of the agencies over promise the deliverables, he used to maintain the reality. I have found many clients preferring this type of attitude and coming to us. His ethical approach has convinced the clients to stay back for years. They like his simple and practical advise, than jargons”.

Jhon has been closely involved in advising, devising and implementing crisis communication strategies and has developed expertise over the years. “It is this function which is the most difficult part of the job; It is more fulfilling to me when it is achieved”, he says with a feeling of satisfaction.

He loves reading books on meta-physics and corporate finance. He wants to develop lot of young professionals and groom them to suit the needs of the industry. He is invited by the various Colleges to interact with students on PR and also as ane examiner for PR subjects.

He wants to be a good leader. “I want to pass on the credit to my colleagues, whenever they achieve something. I do not want to steal their achievement. I still remember Mr Divakar, who groomed me to be a good PR professional in the earlier Agency. He inspired me to become a good leader”, Jhon says with all humility.

Finally when we asked him what he wanted to be in another five years, quickly he replied with confident smile, “I want to become an entrepreneur”.

Chandramouli, a Chemical Engineer looks at the Chemistry of PR

2008-05-06T04:35:00.000-07:00

Recently a senior and an efficient person of a PR Agency, wanted to move to a Corporate for better prospects. Hesitatingly, he revealed this to his CEO over phone. Though for a moment, the CEO was requesting him to continue with his own agency, after realising that the person was moving for better prospects, the CEO gave him the clearance. The story does not end here.

The CEO asked the employee to put his name as a reference in the new company and he sent out a nice testimonial. The CEO also offered to take back, whenever he wanted to join the Agency. He called up his ex-employee on the day of his joining the new company and wished him success.

The CEO is Mr N Chandramouli (40), CEO of Blue Lotus Communications. Mouli, as he is popularly known, gives top priority for the human values and relationship.

This is not an isolated event. "Not only the current employees, but also the ex-employees get personal care from Mouli. Even last week, I got SMS from him" proudly recalls Narrendiran, an ex-exployee.

Any juniormost employee can call him on mobile and take guidance from him. If he is busy, he would call back. (a rarest gesture from CEOs) "Like a teacher, he explains the concepts step by step and makes us to understand", says Poornima, one of the employees of his company.

Mouli, a chemical engineer and MBA, right after his education wanted to become an 'employment generator' rather than 'employment seeker'. For nearly 16 years, he was an entrepreneur in different verticlas like finance, technology and education. Since 8 years, he is in the communication field.

Nearly five years back, he wanted to start his own PR agency. The chemical engineer in him, started thinking of the 'chemistry of PR'. "I entered PR by coincidence, but over a little time, I found that PR was about ‘Who’ you know. It was only about relationships and contacts. In fact many of the agencies have ‘Relations’ attached to their name as a reflection of that. My inspiration to take this up as a business was to transform the concept of PR from ‘Who’ we know to ‘What’ we know. The driver was to try and make professionals be perceived like knowledge oriented business consultants. We have built a business from scratch, growing it from 2 people to 115 people in just 5 years", says Mouli proudly.

The kind of training that Mouli imparts to his people is unique. He invests a lot of time and substantially a large budget on experiential behavioral training, which has great benefits for individuals. "Besides communication techniques, we focus more on human values and human relations", Mouli says.

He is an ardent reader of books. He enjoys travel and discovering new places. He likes meeting people of different culture and learn from them. His favourite book is "Zen & the art of motorcycle maintenance” by Robert Pirsig. The book is like a bible to him. This book is neither about zen nor about motor cycle maintenance. It is all about human values. He has read this book several times. "Each time I read it, it gives me new interpretations of life", says Mouli in a humble tone.

He has a strong social inclination. He believes that more can be done to the society within the scope of work itself. He has developed a system by which each team is mandated to take up a free social client (pro-bono account) in an area of the team’s interest and provide service. "We have done lot of social awareness campaign. This gives us a sense of participation in the social works and satisfaction " says one of the junior employees.

Mouli remains as a 'Brahmachari'. He does not want to get married. His passion and commitment has made him to devote his entire time for the profession. He wants to develop large number of 'knowledgable and skilled youth' for the communication industry. "This is my small contribution to the Nation", says Mouli humbly.

Mouli can be reached at mouli@bluelotuspr.com

Palin Ningthoujam - A young social media enthusiast

2008-04-28T09:32:00.000-07:00

While announcing the concept of PR Icons, we had announced that professionals with a minimum of ten years of expereince only would be considered. After the announcement only, we started thinking about some of the young guys, who have achieved greater things, within short time. Rules are not regid. After all, they are framed by us for our own convenience. We decided to relax the minimum experience in deserving cases.

After the relaxation, the first name that came to our mind was that of Mr Palin Ningthoujam of Delhi. India PR Blog, started by him two years back is a popular name amongst the PR professionals in India.

After completing his PG diploma in Marketing and PR, he joined a PR firm at Delhi in 2002. As a 'kid' in the PR industry, he developed lot of doubts in his mind and was looking for clarifications. He could get it solved through his seniors and friends. But ' social consciousness' in him did not permit him to leave at that level. Two years back, he created a blog India PR Blog and started sharing all the information that are needed for the entrants and professionals in the PR industry.

At that time, when he started the blog, only his friends and himself were the readers. Slowly the word spread acorss the professionals. Today, the blog is read by more than 1000 professionals and students every day. At present, 5 experts are writng for this blog and is ranked within 25 amongst the PR blogs in the world. I am also one of the regular readers of his blog.

He contributes to a number of leading online blogs like Mashable, New Communications Review, and Desicritics. He also writes on his personal blog, Social Media Munching. He is one of the active social media, web 2.0 enthusiast. He is presently working in a leading PR Agency at Delhi offering social media expertise to the clients.

"I love the written word. Starting with Tinkle comics in my 5th standard, my stint with writing goes back a long way. Writing was something I wanted to do. But I also wanted to be in the corporate world and do little bit of creative planning and boardroom talks. So I decided PR was the best choice for me. And I am loving ", says Palin

During his school days, he has shown lot of leadership skills and actively involved himself in the social initiatives. Due to his deep involvement in the career and the social media, he could not find time for social initiatives now. However he has taken up the great task sharing the knowledge for the benefit of young entrants to the profession.

He finds pleasure in driving long distance with his friends once in a month, keeping away from the usual routines.

Palin wants to be among the most knowledgeable PR and social media consultants in the world. He has a significant place in the Global PR industry, in the years to come.

Y. Babji, Hyderabad - A passionate PR teacher cum practitioner

2008-04-20T09:15:00.000-07:00

National PR Day (21st April) Greetings to all the PR practitioners of India. From this day, We will be featuring every week one PR/Corpcom professional. There are many achievers amongst us and are not knwon to outside world. We will be featuring such 'Unsung Heroes and Heroines' and Award winners. This will help the PR fraternity to know them more. Though the minimum experience is flexible, we would like to identify those achievers with more than 10 years of experience. Members may suggest the names of such achievers to me to my personal email id prpoint@gmail.com . In this first edition, we will be featuring Mr Y Babji of Hyderabad

Mr Y Babj (51) of Hyderabad

Whenever a new discussion gets started on a specific subject, the members of prpoint and image management group can expect within few minutes the views of one person in the group with a qualitative analysis of the subject. Anymember will say that is Mr Y Babji of Hyderabad.

Mr Babji, presently working as Public Relations Officer, Khadi & Village Industries Board of Government of Andhra Pradesh was earlier working in various other departments of the Government also. Starting his career as a freelance journalist, the PR instinct in him pushed him to the PR job in the Government. He had the unique opportunities to work with Ministers closely and participate in the policy making of the Government. As against the usual perception of the PR departments of the Governments, he brought in lot of innovations in his work and developed good communication models.

He is not only a PR practitioner. He is also a great academician. After completing Masters degree in Political Science, he graduated himself in 'Law'. His thirst for knowledge did not end there. He completed PG diplomas in (1) Public Relations (2) Journalism (3) Co-operation and Rural Studies and (4) Personnel Management and IR, one after another. One will be surprised that even now, he pursues (1) Master of Science in Public Relations and (2) M. Phil in Political Communication.

Babji is a passionate teacher. He is a visiting professor in many Colleges and Universities in Hyderabad. He is even the member of Board of Studies of Dr B R Ambedkar Open University.

He has been actively involved in the PR movement of India. He is in the National Board of Public Relations Society of India (PRSI), Public Relations Council of India (PRCI), Association of Business Communicators of India (ABCI). He is also the National Vice President of Global Forum for Public Relations (GFPR).

He has received lots of accolades and recognitions from various organisations. Today, (21st April 2008), he is being honoured with the 'Best PR Manager" Award by PRSI.

He considers Dr C V Narasimha Reddi, Editor of PR Voice as his Mentor and Guru. "Even at the age of 75, Dr Reddi is active in promoting PR profession" Mr Bobji says proudly. He draws lot of inspiration from him and he has taken him as his role model.

Babji wants to see the PR profession as the most understood profession by the Government and Non Government sector. "What i have achieved is very small, when compared to many other people, like Dr C V N Reddi. I want to achieve something great in the PR industry at the National level", says modestly. He wants youngsters who join the PR profession to develop their KSA (Knowledge, Skills and Attitude) to be more successful.

During his college days, he was one of the best NCC cadets. Every time, he used to top in the 'Riffle shooting'. He is also fond of 'horse riding'. Now he is missing both. Law does not permit both riffle and riding of horse within the City.

Mr Babji can be reached at bobby.shivyana@gmail.com