Public Relations Practices and Promotional Writing

          Everyone is thrilled by the idea of taking a vacation

or embarking on a new adventure.  How about a cruise to some exotic island somewhere around the Pacific, the Caribbean, South America, or Central America?  Imagine docking at the shores of Aruba, Fiji, the Hawaiian Islands, or the coast of Africa.  In today’s high-tech world, to prepare for that cruise one can immediately jump online, from a home or office desktop/laptop or from a smartphone, iPhone, or tablet to view and research various travel agencies’ websites or Facebook pages to see what kind cruise packages are out there.  Once on a site, like Carnival Cruise Lines, one would be confronted with lots and lots of pictures of couples enjoying a fruity exotic drink while sun bathing on the open-deck at sea, or a family with children running and playing at the beach, as well as a couple holding hands while strolling along the white sandy shores of the Carnival’s land excursion.  Also, displayed are beautiful vivid pictures of sun-sets hovering over the gorgeous blue waters with palm trees nestled in the backdrop, dolphins dancing, sting rays and exotic fish floating around the coral reefs, exotic birds minding their business while travelers marvel at their splendor and beauty.  What has just been describe is to entice the viewer - to help them envision their self on that cruise, that island, and to bring them to the close – to book and purchase the cruise.

Culture and Diversity

For one of our class discussion, we had to review an article by Martin Hahn, Ten Commandments of Intercultural Communication (2005) where Hahn discusses the importance of learning effective intercultural communication skills for today’s growing global community.  He makes reference to as companies hop the “national borders to conduct business,” one does not have to leave their country to encounter various cultures, religions, ethnic groups, and so forth; you may meet them on your job. Hahn offers some insight on how to battle some of the challenges of cultural barriers of effective communication.  Following are the “so-called ten commandments of intercultural communication” (2005) along with my comments regarding the article and the class discussion:

Delivering Bad News Tactfully and Effectively

     

         

 According to Cahn and Abigail’s point of view (2011), "destructive conflict occurs when there is an increase in the number of issues, number of people involved, costs to the participants, and intensity of negative feelings. It can also occur "when there is an escalation and parties fail to consider their options [as well as when it] places heavy reliance on overt power and manipulative techniques" (p. 12). 

The above interpretation of destructive conflict is an appropriate description of a given situation where I am to explain how to deliver bad news tactfully and effectively; following is the scenario: "You are a department manager in a mid-sized company that provides technology support services. You have ten employees who are required to maintain a high level of technical expertise and deliver excellent customer service. One of your employees, who has been with the company for two years, is performing at a substandard level and you have received numerous complaints from customers and coworkers. In addition, this employee has displayed confrontational behavior which has created a hostile environment. You must now meet with this employee and deliver an ultimatum regarding the need for immediate improvement or dismissal."  I am to address how to approach the employee, anticipate the employee's response, and analyze the given conflict resolution techniques I will use.

Media Technology - The Tellies and the Internet

Mass communication is considered as a “form of communication through which institutional sources (often referred to as "the media") address large, diverse audience whose members are physically separated from one another” (Trenholm, 2011, p. 283). These institutional sources use many forms of media technology like e-books, newspapers and magazines, radio, television, or film to deliver information, messages, and even entertainment to their respective audience. Today’s spectators have grown and evolved into a vast global community with a thirst for immediate information.  Institutional sources are more than happy to quench that thirst by developing new and exciting innovative ways of media technology for delivery of desired information.  Before we dive into examining the ultimate technological media tool of all times – Internet - how about we take a little trip into our past and take a glimpse at the evolution of some of the precursor media technologies like the Telley, Telley, and Telley that have painstakingly brought us into this “Information Age” (The Independence Hall Association, 2014) of the Internet.