More Diversity...

I think the things that companies are doing as far as diversity goes. I think it is important because it can be tough to work somewhere where you are treated differently due to something like that. I am no expert on the subject but it really makes a difference in the environment at work if it is made out in the open that all cultures, ages, sex, sexual perferences, etc, are tolerated and that any bad treatment due to one of these issues will not be allowed. It makes people feel safe. I think that usually the companies that have really great polices set in place to protect their employees right to be different are usually the really great places to work anyway. They care enough to put these stipulations in place, therefore they probably do many other great things for their employees as well. And if they do these things for their employees, think of what they probably do for the consumers that buy thier products. It is a sort of ripple effect that gains people's trust.

Diversity

I have been fortunate that I have not encountered that many "bad" situations where people have treated me a certain way based on my ethnicity or color. I have also been fortuante enough also to never really been around people who treated other people bad for those reasons as well. I went to a high school where there was a lot of diversity in the students, though there were not many African Americans. But there were some and there were no issues. In fact, there were groups, but they were made up of people that enjoyed being around each other and it did not matter what color you were or where your ancestors came from. So in that way, I consider myself lucky, but also sheltered. Never really seeing people with these type of prejudices has made it hard for me to know that it exists, though I know it does. So in class, I wrote about the one time I felt there were issues with certain groups, and the group was the younger employees. Everyday I went to work, I felt that there was something against the yournger emploees. THey were treated differently, as if it never matted what they thought and if there were issues over something, the way younger employees were repremanded was different that the way older ones were. At that moment I began to realize that sometimes people are not treated fairly for the silliest reasons. I was treated like I had no experiance with life when I worked there, although no one even knew before my employment there. I think these sort of things go on all over the place, even though sometimes it seems like we as a society are passed it.

American Diabetes Association

I found this article to be really well written. But also, sadly, quite humerous. I just don't understand ADA's stratgy for making sense out of their system of decieding who they can accept payment from and those they do not feel comfortable accepting donations from. I mean, they were considering Burger King, a business which obviously sells more unhealthy products than healthy ones, and yet they consider them as a possible person to recieve donation from. Weird. I think that instead of justifying what they are doing by trying to make guidelines, either they should take money from whomever and a justify as needinf funding or they should just not take money from any companies whom are obviously trying to trick consumers into thinking their products are not that unhealthy. I don't think that I would let anyone put my name on their label if it made my company look bad, and frankly some of the companies they allow to put their name on their labels only makes them look bad. I find this topic interesting because it really has some gray areas. On one hand these foundations need money. On the other, the sort of villian they are up against is exactly who is funding them to find ways to help people. It's like the villian is helping to find a way to stop itself, only they must know that there is no way to do this, or why else would they? But on the other hand, these organizations need to stand up to the companies that they are unconcievebaly upgainst and not take money. But it is the inbetween that is odd.

Conflicts of Interest

I really enjoyed the article. I think that this brings up many good points. But I have to admit that when we talked about this topic in class, it was hard for me to understand why it was a big deal just because I was thinking that if tobacco companies want to give money to these orgainzations, why can they not accept the money? Mainly because the fact of the matter is they need moeny for these organizations to actually research cancer. But after reading the article, I understand that if cancer organizations are taking money from these companies and sort of changing their focus so that they can accept the money given to them by these companies, that is a completely different story. I guess I was thinking that Phillip Morris gives money and supports many organizations that are against smoking. But the fact is that people like to smoke and even though everyone in the entire world knows it is bad, many people still smoke. I just thought that Phillip Morris supports these organizations to "call it good" and so that he can say, " Hey I do my part" and not catch any flack about everything. Lets face it though; people are still going to smoke.
Anyways, as I was thinking about it all, I thought that other organizations exist without taking money from the very people who they are up against. Think of Mother's Against Drunk Driving. I don't think I could take them as serious if they were backed by alcohol companies. Because alcohol companies want you to drink. And the more you buy to drink, the more money they make. And the ultimate goal of Mother's Against Drunk Driving is that people will not drink and drive, but more than that, not drink. Because as long as people drink, someone will always drive. It is the same thing with cancer research. There are reasons people get cancer and there are ways that people can prevent getting cancer. And those methods are just as important as the research to cure it.
When companies do this, it makes them less creditable. They don't need to accept money from the very people they are up against.

YouTube Apology

I think this article was really interesting but I also find it refreshing that companies are finding better ways of getting their apologies out there so that people can understand what happened and the company's version of why it happened and what they are doing about the problem to ensure that it doesn't happen again. To me, it means they are taking responibility for what occured and want more people to hear about the problem and how they are taking the enishative to fix it. This is a prime example of taking the new media and using it to your advantage, which to me is different than what some companies are doing to merely get into the new wave of media.
I do however think it is important what the article went on to say. If someone is going to get on YouTube and not be sincere about what happened and not be truly sorry, then the whole deal is a waste and, more than that, bad publicity. The deliverance of such apologies, combined with timing, is what is really important. WHere and how the apology is delivered is merely a component.
But I like the idea. And the airline was smart to reach out to people that way.

Blogging... Fake blogs

This is just stupid to me. If you fake a blog and pay someone to write about your company, people are going to find out. People find out and then they think that the company is just desperate for publicity and it looks really bad. I think that these days companies just see all these new concepts, and without really thinking about benefits and consequences, they jump into the trying these new outlets out. I think it is stupid. Just because there are new outlets does not mean that they will work for every company. It is the public relations department to realize what will be the most beneficial to the company and which ones are simply not a good idea. Blogging and pretending to be real people and telling everyone you are real person and really being a person that either works for the person or was hired to blog by the company is not a good idea. People are smart, and they will find out and it will do nothing but make the company look like liars. It just isn't a good idea and it is dishonest. Instead of making the company look good and giving it interesting publicity, it makes the company look bad and gives them negative publicity when and if people find out. Again, I just think companies are just jumping into these media outlets just because it is trendy and not because it is beneficial to the company and the company's image.

Articles Posted... Social Networking and Fake Blogs

I found the article on social networking to be really interesting. Some of the things mentioned on within the article just really made me think about my own experiences with social networking and the difference between a person using these networks and a business. As a college student, I have profiles on myspace and facebook and I am subjected to the advertising and groups trying to get people to join and people inviting you to big events where they want lots of people to come, etc. I just think that it all really depends on how much time I can spend looking over that sort of stuff. Some days I don't do anything besides check my inbox and my wall to see if anyone has written me and then I log off. On those days, it would not even matter how good the content of any companies page has, I won't visit it due to time constrictions. But there are days when I have more time and I do browse. The most important thing that I feel that the article mentioned was that companies need to stick with their particular brand. Target is known for certain things; Walmart is known for other things; But theses stores need to know how they are perceived and not try to fight it. Target is a completely different business as Walmart, though they are often said to be under the same category. I go to Target to get a little bit better clothing (sometimes they have better stuff), also I buy shoes and accessories sometimes from there. I will not buy these things from Walmart
(it has always been my experience that they did not have anything that I would really like), however I spend far more money at Walmart. When I need to go to the grocery store, and I live by both a Walmart and a Target, I go to Walmart. Food and other products for the house, Walmart has a far better selection. I think that with Walmart being more of a store that leads in this household area, why are they trying to get teenagers to spend money there? Teens and their parents already spend money there on dorm stuff, though it probably is not furniture. I think when Walmart went on Facebook, it was a stupid move. They should spend there money else where. Maybe moving their interests to Moms shopping for back to school stuff or something like that. Just because people are using these network does not mean that it is a good outlet for a company to get there name out there. Posting on these outlets have to have good reasons (a strategy) rather than just because everyone else is doing it.

PRSA ETHICS VS ETHICS DISCUSSED IN CLASS

I think that the ethics we discussed in class have similarities to the PRSA ethics. The obvious ones that I found were that the humaneness was most like the PRSA's advocacy. Humaneness is like having the public's interest at heart and genuinely caring about the people you are working for or with. I think this is a good core value; one that should naturally to most people but also one that sort of sums up the golden rule about caring for people and wishing good things upon people. Many people these days only care for themselves, and everyone looks at things like "that's your problem" type thing. I also thought that the stewardship core value and the expertise core PRSA value were similar because they are saying "this is our brand, this is what we stand for," and of course when you stand out there and say that you want people to think that you are good at what you do and that you know what you are talking about. Of course the truth core value and honesty core value are similar. They mean the same thing. If you tell the truth, you are honest. I think that the most "trouble" happens when people or businesses simply do not tell the truth. People will forgive you if you are honest about making a mistake. But when you lye, people automatically think of you differently. Your reputation is tarnished. I think that the lest couple of core values are different between the two (the one we discussed in class, and the ones listed on PRSA). The difference is that the PRSA one lists loyalty. which I think is different than justice or freedom. Loyalty is means you are committed to never making someone or something look bad, you always stand behind it, etc. In the PRSA case, they are faithful to those they represent, as they should be. To me, freedom is the right to chose, the right to be different, your right to do anything. Justice is what happens when you didn't get the freedom you were owed, and now you need to action to be taken. I think that all three core values are important, but I think that it matters with the situation as to what are the needs of that organization.

Articles/Apple Post

I think the articles that were posted on Lambiase blog were really good examples of the way that companies can handle PR and do a really good or really bad job. In the McKinney cheer leading sponsor story, I think that the school district was already really publicized when the cheerleaders posted the pictures of them online in front of a condom store in uniform. It looked really bad on the image of not just the cheer leading store but also the school district. I think that the school did a really bad job at handling the entire situation because they could have used it to do something positive LIKE have some sort of seminar about the kind of things people are posting online, especially on myspace and facebook, and it is important for people/athletes/scholarship recipients/miss America contestants/teachers, etc. are getting caught doing things and it is simply because of the type of material that is being posted online. Also, this type of material is being used by people in court cases etc. They could have done some type of seminar; I've seen on the news that colleges are having these people come and talk to students about this issue.It's a big deal and students/people in general need to be aware of these dangers. But the school district did next to nothing, then fire the person who was really trying to do the right thing, and really sent mixed messages to people.
Same thing with Southwest. Horrible. Mistakes happen, Southwest should have taken an immediate stance on the issue. They can not use the "we will just sit back and let it die down." It doesn't work like that and it an apology is made, and steps are taken to help the company, such as an official policy come out about dress code, then laying low for a while, trying to stay out of headlines might be okay. Saying nothing does nothing for you. It really hurts you.
Apple really did a messed up thing to it's commit ed buyers, the one that are loyal to every Apple product, and the one that care about Apple the most. And then the company allowed Steve Jobs to almost be sarcastic in what he said the those people who expressed their frustration with the situation and then the PR people must have gotten involved and told him what needed to happen. But needless to say, it was a classic case of a company not understanding that anyone out there can make phones, MP3 players, computers, whatever. But you have to keep customers, and make people loyal to your brand. Without that, you are nothing.

Supply Chains

I think that supply chains do ave a responsibility to know wha is going on within their businesses. It is their business, what brings them livelyhood, and therefore it is their busines to know how the company operates and things that are happening within its walls. I think that every good business owner knows what goes on within the company that they own, and usually this allows for the company to be sucessful. Bosses that know every detail about their companies are usually the companines that people become loyal to, and I think this happens to be because people like the services that they render but also becasue those kind of comapnies are good to work for. I always find myself becoming loyal to comapnies that their employees are happy. It makes things so much more pleasent as a consumer. In business, I like that owners should think that everyhting that has to do with their business is their business. They should know about everything. It will do good for not only their consumers but their employees and also it would help immensly with ethical dilemmas, because most likely their wouldn't be any.

What does the Cosmopolitan Model have to do with PR?

I think the model is just something to get people to recognize how they feel about an issue, why they feel that way (though like the book says there probably is not any really good explanation) and then helps with thinking about why other people may feel differently. I really think that PR is about dealing with people, and truly understanding where people are coming from so that we can do our jobs correctly in this business. We have to understand our markets and our consumers so that we can keep them happy, or in the event that something is done wrong, we can understand the best way to fix the problem. It is very important to our jobs in the PR business. We have to be careful not to judge or offend, and we have to try and see others point of view, despite how we feel about the issue.

Does Everyone Matter...

I think that what Appiah is trying to convey is that every person matters to themselves and everything that each person does makes sense to them. In his book, Appiah says time and time again that people believe what they believe and they have their own reasons for believing those things or ideas, and are not easily persuaded otherwise. It is important to understand that even though we, as in everyone else, may not agree with what everyone else does, it is mostly because we do not fully understand the beliefs or customs of other people. I think that the underlying message is that everyone matters most to themselves.
Again, if you take the statement "everyone matters the most to themselves," and analyze that, I think it is pretty easily understood that America's supply chains are included in that statement. The suppliers, distribute rs, etc. matter most to themselves, and probably look after their own interests and understandings more than anything else. That is why sometimes incidents happen and things get covered up or excuses are made, etc. Supply chains are looking out for their own interests first and foremost and after that, they worry with caring about others.