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Do you have the courage to do what you believe in? Do you have the courage to complete the task even though the whole world thinks you are crazy? Do you have the courage to continue with your dreams when they appear to be impossible dreams? Or do you just cave in and find good excuses as to why they were impossible? The question is: Do you have the courage to follow your heart?

It seems to us that one of the traits of successful people is their ability to keep focussed on the ‘inner desire’ no matter what. They are people who believe in themselves and can close their ears to people who say ‘it can’t be done! ‘It’s impossible’ ‘You’re crazy!’ They close their minds to people who want to impose limits on their lives. They have the ability to focus on the positive at all times. They don’t see obstacles they only see the solutions.

These are not exceptional people. You can do this too. All you need to do is eradicate the limiting beliefs you have that tell you that you are not good enough or ‘people like us don’t do these things, or it’s all right for them but me…………. To be like them, successful, all you have to do is believe and live by the understanding that everything you achieve or fail to achieve is a direct result of your own thoughts.
People who make a difference in life do not merely, TRY to do something they Do it. To try to do something is just to create an illusion in your thoughts. Have a go at the following experiment:

IF you are sitting down…. TRY to stand up. Did you succeed? Then you didn’t try, you did it. Did you remain seated? Then you didn’t succeed but with effort and commitment, unless you have a disability, you can succeed. The point is. TRY is a nothing word designed to ensure that whenever you start anything new you don’t put full commitment and courage into it. You just go in half hearted and hope it works. Guess what; whatever you put in you get out. So go in half hearted and get out indifference i.e. no success. Go in with full commitment and courage and you will succeed. You may not succeed in the time scale you wish but we promise, you will succeed. All you have to do is,
focus your thoughts and energy,
work hard and make effort for as long as it takes,
be courageous and remove or go around the obstacles you meet on the way.

You can achieve whatever you want, all you have to have is the belief that you can do it. The belief that you can make a difference in this world.

Just stop for a moment. Ask yourself:

Do I believe I can make a difference in the world?

If I were to die tomorrow, what would I be remembered for?

Are you happy with that?

It’s your choice. You can make a difference in the world, if you want to. You choose.

The mountain that stops you achieving is inside you. It’s your fear. It’s what stops you from being a success.

It’s what allows you to say I’ll try rather than I’ll go for it 100%.
It’s those thoughts that constantly show you the negative, why it cannot be done. The self defeating thoughts of why you are not the person to do it because you are not good enough. No one in your family has ever done it before. It’s the voice inside your head that belittles you, disapproves of what you are going to do and even shows contempt towards you.

Pierluigi Collina, a football referee now acknowledged to be the best referee in the world and one of the greatest referees of all time said:

“Faced with the choice between challenge and fear, I never have any doubts,
I’ll take challenge every time”

Do not allow yourself to be a victim of your thoughts. Allow yourself to live, to reach your dreams. You owe it to yourself to reach your dream. To achieve your potential. To make a difference to the world. You need to write more on your epitaph than S/he survived until s/he was ?? years of age.

It’s quite simple to succeed in life: you have to be different to other people. You have to do things differently. You have to change those negative, disabling limiting beliefs. You have to keep focussed on the job in hand. You have to do it better than anyone else. When you put effort into thinking and talking and being better then naturally you feel better and you have a better life. Therefore you deserve to succeed because you are willing to keep going when others fall by the wayside.

Remember life is about learning not perfection. Go for it. You have the courage.

Graham and Julie
www.desktop-meditation.com

About the Author: To improve your intuition, initiative and energy levels please go to:www.desktop-meditation.com

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Focus is the key to a successful startup

The definition of a startup means you have very few resources to employ and little time to get them to do something valuable. The clock is always ticking, and the money (if you even have any) is running out by the day. With so little to leverage, you need to make sure that the focus of your company’s product offer is as razor sharp as possible.

Don’t be all you can be. Be as little as you can be.

Most startup companies fail because they try to be too many things to too many people right from the onset. They think of every possible option they could load into their product offer. While this may give them the feeling of being one of the “big boys,” the grim reality is they are not. In fact by trying to be too many things from the start, these companies often end up delivering no real value at all.

Instead of trying to be all things to all people, try being one thing to all people. Think of PayPal, the highly successful startup that allowed users to e-mail money over the Internet to each other. PayPal could have chosen a million options for their offer. They could have become an on-line credit card company, an auction site, a loan provider and so on. But what made the company successful was their focus on only one offer – e-mailing money from one person to the other.

PayPal did one simple thing so well that the industry giant eBay purchased them for $1.5 billion in 2002, even after eBay had already built the same service themselves. PayPal is a great example of a company keeping a sharp focus one doing on thing right even when so many great opportunities could have easily distracted them.

Bite off less than you can chew

Delivering your product to market is an amazing feat to begin with. Even still, a common problem among small companies is their inability to predict what it will take to actually support a product once it has gone to market. It’s easy to conceive complex products with lots of features.

But actually bringing that product to market and supporting its use with customers is a whole different story.

Instead of trying to roll out everything and the kitchen sink in your approach to market, just roll out the sink. If you find that you can support your product just fine after it’s been successfully selling in the first year, then go ahead and add to it. It’s a lot easier to add features along the way than it is to support features you don’t have the resources for to begin with.

You have ten seconds to get it right

Your customer has a life, even if you do not. They are being constantly bombarded with marketing messages from the latest movies releases to the newest type of shampoo. They don’t have the time or energy to stop their entire day to focus on just your product. So if you are lucky enough to have ten seconds of their attention, you had better make good use of it.

The exercise of developing your value proposition in ten seconds is a great way to distill down your feature set to those items that will get people’s attention right away. If it’s not going to add value to the ten second pitch, it’s not critical to your product’s success. If you can’t get your customer’s attention with the one key benefit to your product, the rest of your features will never see the light of day to begin with.

Stay on target gold leader

Your product launch is just the beginning of keeping your focus. Once you have brought your product to market and enjoyed some early success, it may become even harder to stay focused. Now you have customers calling you and recommending (or demanding!) features to be added and services to be provided. All of these distractions make it even harder to keep you and your team focused on a single goal.

Fortunately the process of keeping your resources focused post-launch is entirely the same. You need to pick your battles and allocate your resources toward the few initiatives that will be best served to do the one thing right that is truly driving your company. Serving the needs and whims of every customer sounds great, but it can also be a terrible detour when trying to keep the forward progress of your company moving.

If at any point during your journey you’re unsure whether or not you’re spending your time and resources effectively, just ask yourself one question, “Is this driving the core benefit of our product?”. If the answer is “yes”, you’re headed in the right direction.

About the Author: Wil Schroter is a serial entrepreneur, author, and public speaker. Wil has started and sold three multi-million dollar companies. He has been recognized as U.S. Small Business Person of the Year, twice as the Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year(1999 & 2004), and is a member of the Business First Top 40 under forty. His latest book “Go Big or Go Home” will be available in 2005. Connect directly with Wil at wschroter@yahoo.com

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Because good public relations can alter individual perceptionand lead to changed behaviors among key outside audiences.And that can help business, non-profit and associationmanagers achieve their managerial objectives.

It all happens when you do something positive about thebehaviors of those important external audiences of yoursthat most affect your operation. In particular when youpersuade those key outside folks to your way of thinking,then help move them to take actions that allow yourdepartment, division or subsidiary to succeed.

I believe the key to good PR is this reality. People act ontheir own perception of the facts before them, which leadsto predictable behaviors about which something can bedone. When we create, change or reinforce that opinionby reaching, persuading and moving-to-desired-action thevery people whose behaviors affect the organization themost, the public relations mission is accomplished.

In other words, your public relations effort must involvemore than special events, brochures and news releases ifyou really want to get your money’s worth.

The payoff can make your day: membership applicationson the rise; customers starting to make repeat purchases;fresh proposals for strategic alliances and joint ventures;community leaders beginning to seek you out; welcomebounces in show room visits; prospects starting to dobusiness with you; higher employee retention rates,capital givers or specifying sources beginning to lookyour way, and even politicians and legislators starting toview you as a key member of the business, non-profit orassociation communities.

But who among your PR team really understands theblueprint outlined above and shows commitment to itsimplementation, starting with key audience perceptionmonitoring? Luckily, your PR people are already in theperception and behavior business, so they should be ofreal use for this initial opinion monitoring project.

Be certain that your public relations people really acceptwhy it’s SO important to know how your most importantoutside audiences perceive your operations, products orservices. Make sure they believe that perceptions almostalways result in behaviors that can help or hurt youroperation.

Talk it over with them, especially your game plan formonitoring and gathering perceptions by questioningmembers of your most important outside audiences.Questions along these lines: how much do you know aboutour organization? Have you had prior contact with us andwere you pleased with the interchange? Are you familiarwith our services or products and employees? Have youexperienced problems with our people or procedures?

Because it can run into real money using professionalsurvey firms to do the opinion monitoring work, you maywish to use those PR folks of yours in that capacity sincethey’re already in the perception and persuasion business.But, whether it’s your people or a survey firm asking thequestions, the objective remains the same: identify untruths,false assumptions, unfounded rumors, inaccuracies,misconceptions and any other negative perception thatmight translate into hurtful behaviors.

What your aiming at, obviously, is a PR goal that doessomething about the most serious distortions you discoverduring your key audience perception monitoring. Will itbe to straighten out that dangerous misconception?Correct that gross inaccuracy? Or, stop that potentiallypainful rumor cold?

Of course, without the right strategy to tell you how toproceed, you won’t get there at all. So keep in mind thatthere are just three strategic options available when itcomes to doing something about perception and opinion.Change existing perception, create perception where theremay be none, or reinforce it. The wrong strategy pick willtaste like horseradish on your pancakes, so be sure yournew strategy fits well with your new public relations goal.You wouldn’t want to select “change” when the factsdictate a strategy of reinforcement.

Here, you must come up with a well-written message and sendit to members of your target audience. It’s always a challengeto create an actionable message that will help persuade anyaudience to your way of thinking.

What you want now is your strongest writers because s/hemust build some very special, corrective language. Wordsthat are not merely compelling, persuasive and believable,but clear and factual if they are to shift perception/opiniontowards your point of view and lead to the behaviors youhave in mind.

After your PR team has signed off on draft copy of yourmessage, you move on to the next selection process — thecommunications tactics most likely to carry your messageto the attention of your target audience. There are scoresthat are available.

From speeches, facility tours, emails andbrochures to consumer briefings, media interviews,newsletters, personal meetings and many others. But youmust be certain that the tactics you pick are known to reachfolks like your audience members.

An alert: you may wish to avoid too loud a voice withthis kind of message and unveil it before smaller meetingsand presentations rather than using higher-profile newsreleases, as the credibility of any message is fragile andalways at stake.

From this point forward, you’ll start getting requests forprogress reports, which tells you and your PR team to begina second perception monitoring session with members of yourexternal audience. You’ll want to use many of the samequestions used in the first benchmark session. But now,you will be on red alert for signs that the bad newsperception is being altered in your direction.

It does seem fortunate that such matters usually can beaccelerated simply by adding more communicationstactics as well as increasing their frequencies.

The value of public relations to managers becomes clearerwhen you realize that the people you deal with behave likeeveryone else – they act upon their perceptions of the factsthey hear about you and your operation. Which means youreally have little choice but to deal promptly and effectivelywith those perceptions by doing what is necessary to reachand move those key external audiences of yours to actionsyou desire.

About the Author: Bob Kelly counsels, writes and speaks to business, non-profit and association managers about using the fundamental premise of public relations to achieve their operating objectives. He has been DPR, Pepsi-Cola Co.; AGM-PR, Texaco Inc.; VP-PR, Olin Corp.; VP-PR, Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock Co.; director of communi-cations, U.S. Department of the Interior, and deputy assistant press secretary, The White House. He holds a bachelor of science degree from Columbia University, major in public relations. mailto:bobkelly@TNI.net Visit:http://www.prcommentary.com

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Business, non-profit and association managers committing their public relations resources to (1) doing something about the behaviors of those important outside audiences that most affect their operation, (2) creating the kind of external stakeholder behavior change that leads directly to achieving their managerial objectives, and (3) doing so by persuading those key outside folks to their way of thinking by helping to move them to take actions that allow their department, division or subsidiary to succeed – greatly increase the chances of success for their operation.

Thus, feeding the engine of their own economic growth AND that of the nation at large.

But, in reality, it takes more than good intentions for any manager to alter individual perception leading to changed behaviors, something of profound importance to ALL business, non-profit and association managers.

What they need is a simple PR blueprint that gets everyone working towards the same external audience behaviors insuring that the organization’s public relations effort stays sharply focused.

For example, a blueprint like this: people act on their own perception of the facts before them, which leads to predictable behaviors about which something can be done. When we create, change or reinforce that opinion by reaching, persuading and moving-to-desired-action the very people whose behaviors affect the organization the most, the public relations mission is accomplished.

In that way, those same business, non-profit and association managers can see results such as new proposals for strategic alliances and joint ventures; customers making repeat purchases; prospects starting to work with them; membership applications on the rise; capital givers or specifying sources looking their way, and even bounces in showroom visits.

But HOW those managers pull that off forms the real challenge.

Here’s how the best of them can do it. They find out who among their key external audiences is behaving in ways that help or hinder the achievement of their objectives. Then, they list them according to how severely their behaviors affect their organization.

But precisely HOW do most members of that key outside audience perceive their organization? If the budget to pay for what could be costly professional survey counsel isn’t there, Ms. or Mr. manager and his or her PR colleagues will have to monitor those perceptions themselves. Actually, they should be quite familiar with perception and behavior matters.

Getting that activity under way means meeting with members of that outside audience and asking questions like “Are you familiar with our services or products?” “Have you ever had contact with anyone from our organization? Was it a satisfactory experience?” And if you are that manager, you must be sensitive to negative statements, especially evasive or hesitant replies. And watch carefully for false assumptions, untruths, misconceptions, inaccuracies and potentially damaging rumors. When you find such, they will need to be corrected, as they inevitably lead to negative behaviors.

The job now is to select the specific perception to be altered which then becomes your public relations goal. You obviously want to correct those untruths, inaccuracies, misconceptions or false assumptions.

One of the painful aspects of the whole drill is that a PR goal without a strategy to show you how to get there, is like a three-bean salad without the beans. So, as you select one of three strategies (especially constructed to create perception or opinion where there may be none, or change or reinforce it,) what you want to do is insure that the goal and its strategy match each other. You wouldn’t want to select “change existing perception” when current perception is just right suggesting that “reinforce” strategy.

The moment has come when you must create a compelling message carefully constructed to alter your key target audience’s perception, as specified by your public relations goal.

Keep in mind that you can always combine your corrective message with another news announcement or presentation which may give it more credibility by downplaying the apparent need for such a correction.

The content of the message must be compelling and quite clear about what perception needs clarification or correction, and why. Of course you must be truthful and your position logically explained and believable if it is to hold the attention of members of that target audience, and actually move perception in your direction.

Some allude to the communications tactics necessary to move your message to the attention of that key external audience, as “beasts of burden” because they must carry your persuasive new thoughts to the eyes and ears of those important outside people.

Actually, we have a wide choice because the list of tactics is long indeed. It includes letters-to-the-editor, brochures, press releases and speeches. Or, you might choose radio and newspaper interviews, personal contacts, facility tours or customer briefings. There are scores available and the only selection requirement is that the communications tactics you choose have a record of reaching people just like the members of your key target audience.

Of course, things can always be accelerated by adding more communications tactics, AND by increasing their frequencies.

It won’t be long before those around you will be asking about progress. But you will already be hard at work remonitoring perceptions among your target audience members to test the effectiveness of your communications tactics. Using questions similar to those used during your earlier monitoring session, you’ll now become beady-eyed looking for signs that audience perceptions are beginning to move in your general direction.

Yes, performed in this manner, public relations obviously does feed the engine of YOUR economic growth and, thus, that of the nation at large.

But do keep your eye on the core of this approach: persuade your most important outside audiences with the greatest impacts on your organization to your way of thinking. Then move them to take actions that help your department, division or subsidiary prevail.

About the Author: Bob Kelly counsels, writes and speaks to business, non-profit and association managers about using the fundamental premise of public relations to achieve their operating objectives. He has been DPR, Pepsi-Cola Co.; AGM-PR, Texaco Inc.; VP-PR, Olin Corp.; VP-PR, Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock Co.; director of communi-cations, U.S. Department of the Interior, and deputy assistant press secretary, The White House. He holds a bachelor of science degree from Columbia University, major in public relations. mailto:bobkelly@TNI.net Visit:http://www.prcommentary.com

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As a business, non-profit or association manager, whatdo you want?

Publicity that delivers newspaper and talk show mentions,or behavior change among your key outside audiencesthat leads directly to achieving your managerial objectives?

Special events that attract a lot of people, or public relationsthat persuades your most important outside audiences toyour way of thinking, then moves them to take actions thathelp your department, division or subsidiary succeed?

Zippy brochures and videos, or a way for you to dosomething positive about the behaviors of those externalaudiences of yours that MOST affect your organization?

As a manager, what I believe you need to know about PRare two realities:

1) The right PR really CAN alter individual perception andlead to changed behaviors that help you succeed, and 2),your public relations effort must involve more than specialevents, brochures and news releases if you really want toget your money’s worth,

The underlying truth about PR goes this way: people acton their own perception of the facts before them, which leadsto predictable behaviors about which something can be done.When we create, change or reinforce that opinion by reaching,persuading and moving-to-desired-action the very peoplewhose behaviors affect the organization the most, the publicrelations mission is accomplished.

And it can generate results like; prospects starting to workwith you; customers making repeat purchases; strongerrelationships with the educational, labor, financial andhealthcare communities; improved relations withgovernment agencies and legislative bodies, and evencapital givers or specifying sources looking your way

Once the program gets rolling, you also should see resultssuch as new proposals for strategic alliances and joint ventures;rebounds in showroom visits; membership applications on the rise;community service and sponsorship opportunities; enhancedactivist group relations, and expanded feedback channels,not to mention new thoughtleader and special event contacts.

That’s a lot of results from even a high-impact blueprint.

It almost goes without saying that your PR crew – agencyor staff – must be committed to you, as the senior projectmanager, to the PR blueprint and its implementation,starting with target audience perception monitoring.

Is it crucially important that your most important outsideaudiences really perceive your operations, products orservices in a positive light? Of course, so assure yourselfthat your PR staff has bought into the whole effort. Beespecially careful that they accept the reality that perceptionsalmost always lead to behaviors that can help or hurt yourunit.

Sit down with your PR team and review the PR blueprintin detail, especially the plan for monitoring and gatheringperceptions by questioning members of your mostimportant outside audiences. Questions like these: howmuch do you know about our organization? How muchdo you know about our services or products andemployees? Have you had prior contact with us andwere you pleased with the interchange? Have youexperienced problems with our people or procedures?

Professional survey people obviously can handle theperception monitoring phases of your program, IF thebudget is available. But always remember that your PRpeople are also in the perception and behaviorbusiness and can pursue the same objective: identifyuntruths, false assumptions, unfounded rumors,inaccuracies, misconceptions and any other negativeperception that might translate into hurtful behaviors.

What about your public relations goal? You need a goalstatement that speaks to the aberrations that showed upduring your key audience perception monitoring. Andit could call for straightening out that dangerousmisconception, or correcting that gross inaccuracy, ordoing something about that damaging rumor.

When you set a goal, you need a strategy that shows youhow to get there. You have three strategic choices whenit comes to handling a perception or opinion challenge:create perception where there may be none, change theperception, or reinforce it. A bad strategy pick will tastelike marinara sauce on your brownies, so be certain thenew strategy fits well with your new public relations goal.For example, you don’t want to select “change” when thefacts dictate a “reinforce” strategy.

Because persuading an audience to your way of thinkingis awfully hard work, your PR team must come up withjust the right, corrective language. Words that arecompelling, persuasive and believable AND clear andfactual. You must do this if you are to correct a perceptionby shifting opinion towards your point of view, leading tothe desired behaviors.

Sit down again with your communications specialists andreview your message for impact and persuasiveness. Then,select the communications tactics most likely to carry yourwords to the attention of your target audience.

You can pickfrom dozens that are available. From speeches, facility tours,emails and brochures to consumer briefings, media interviews,newsletters, personal meetings and many others. But be surethat the tactics you pick are known to reach folks just likeyour audience members.

You’ve heard the old bromide about the credibility of amessage depending on its delivery method. On the chanceit’s true, you might think about introducing it to smallergatherings rather than using higher-profile tactics suchas news releases or talk show appearances.

The need to produce a progress report will sound thealert for you and your PR folks to return to the field for asecond perception monitoring session with members ofyour external audience. Using many of the same questionsused in the first benchmark session, you’ll now be watchingvery carefully for signs that the bad news perception isbeing altered in your direction.

If impatience enters the fray, you can always accelerate thingswith more communications tactics and increased frequencies.

Finally, like a military unit, your public relations effort canuse an action-oriented motto: the right PR really CAN alterindividual perception and lead directly to changed behaviorsthat help you succeed.

About the Author: Bob Kelly counsels, writes and speaks to business, non-profit and association managers about using the fundamental premise of public relations to achieve their operating objectives. He has been DPR, Pepsi-Cola Co.; AGM-PR, Texaco Inc.; VP-PR, Olin Corp.; VP-PR, Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock Co.; director of communi-cations, U.S. Department of the Interior, and deputy assistant press secretary, The White House. He holds a bachelor of science degree from Columbia University, major in public relations. mailto:bobkelly@TNI.net Visit:http://www.prcommentary.com

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Unfortunately, there are managers who define publicrelations by its applications. Which explains neither itsunderlying strengths nor what PR is all about.

The casual observer is left with a confusion of tactical,application-oriented definitions of the public relationsfunction: Is it publicity? Crisis management? Specialevents? Reputation management? Promotion? Or a slewof other tactics in which we engage from time to time?

Which is it? More important, just what lies at the core ofmanagerial public relations anyway?

I believe the core lies in doing something positive aboutthe behaviors of those important outside audiences of yoursthat most affect your operation.

In other words, create external stakeholder behavior change –the kind that leads directly to achieving your managerialobjectives.

And do so by persuading those key outside folks to yourway of thinking, then help move them to take actions thatallow your department, division or subsidiary to succeed.

Luckily, there’s also a blueprint at the center of public relationsto help you cement that PR core for your own managerial benefit.

And it goes like this: People act on their own perception of thefacts before them, which leads to predictable behaviors aboutwhich something can be done. When we create, change orreinforce that opinion by reaching, persuading and moving-to-desired-action the very people whose behaviors affect theorganization the most, the public relations mission is accomplished.

And for managers such as you, here’s the type of results thatcould emerge. Healthy bounces in show room visits; communityleaders seeking you out; prospects starting to do business withyou; membership applications on the rise; customers makingrepeat purchases; fresh proposals for strategic alliances andjoint ventures in the inbox; capital givers or specifying sourceslooking your way, and even politicians and legislatorsbeginning to view you as a key member of the business,non-profit or association communities.

You also need PR team members who understand that blueprintand commit themselves to its implementation, starting withkey audience perception monitoring. Let’s face it, your PRpeople are already in the perception and behavior business,so they should be of real use for this initial opinion monitoringproject.

Caveat: you must be certain your public relations people reallybelieve – deep down — why it’s SO important to know howyour most important outside audiences perceive youroperations, products or services. Make sure they accept thereality that perceptions almost always lead to behaviors thatcan help or hurt your unit.

Talk it over with them, especially your plan for monitoringand gathering perceptions by questioning members of yourmost important outside audiences. Questions like these: howmuch do you know about our organization? Have you hadprior contact with us and were you pleased with the interchange?Are you familiar with our services or products and employees?Have you experienced problems with our people or procedures?

While professional survey firms can always be hired to do theopinion monitoring work, they also can cost big bucks. So,whether it’s your people or a survey firm asking the questions,the objective remains the same: identify untruths, false assumptions,unfounded rumors, inaccuracies, misconceptions and any othernegative perception that might translate into hurtful behaviors.

The PR goal, obviously, is to do something about the mostserious distortions you discover during your key audienceperception monitoring. Will it be to straighten out thatdangerous misconception? Correct that gross inaccuracy?Or, stop that potentially bloody rumor dead in its tracks?

Truth is, you won’t get there at all without the right strategyto tell you how to proceed. But keep in mind that there are justthree strategic options available when it comes to doing somethingabout perception and opinion. Change existing perception, createperception where there may be none, or reinforce it. The wrongstrategy pick will taste like pepper flakes on your Crème Brulee,so be sure your new strategy fits well with your new publicrelations goal.

You wouldn’t want to select “change” whenthe facts dictate a “reinforce” strategy.

Now it’s time to put together a well-written message and directit to members of your target audience. It’s always a challengeto create an actionable message that will help persuade anyaudience to your way of thinking.

You need your best scribes for this one because s/he must buildsome very special, corrective language. Words that are not merely compelling, persuasive and believable, but clear and factual ifthey are to shift perception/opinion towards your point of viewand lead to the behaviors you have in mind.

Once you’ve run draft copy by your PR team, it’s on to the nextselection process — the communications tactics most likelyto carry your message to the attention of your target audience.There are scores that are available. From speeches, facility tours,emails and brochures to consumer briefings, media interviews,newsletters, personal meetings and many others. But you mustbe certain that the tactics you pick are known to reach folks likeyour audience members,

By the way, you may wish to avoid “shouting too loud” andunveil your message before smaller meetings and presentationsrather than using higher-profile news releases, as the credibilityof any message is fragile and always at stake.

The people around you will start agitating in short order forprogress reports, which signals to you and your PR team to getgoing on a second perception monitoring session with membersof your external audience. You’ll want to use many of the samequestions used in the first benchmark session. Big difference thistime is that you will be on red alert for signs that the bad newsperception is being altered in your direction.

Incidentally, I’ve always thought it fortunate that such mattersusually can be accelerated simply by adding more communicationstactics as well as increasing their frequencies.

So, at the end of the day, what you want the new PR plan toaccomplish is to persuade your most important outsidestakeholders to your way of thinking, then move them tobehave in a way that leads to the success of your department,division or subsidiary.

Public relations should no longer be a mystery when the peopleyou deal with do, in fact, behave suspiciously like everyoneelse – they act upon their perceptions of the facts they hearabout you and your operation. Which means you really havelittle choice but to deal promptly and effectively with thoseperceptions by doing what is necessary to reach and movethose key external audiences of yours to actions you desire.

About the Author: Bob Kelly counsels, writes and speaks to business, non-profit and association managers about using the fundamental premise of public relations to achieve their operating objectives. He has been DPR, Pepsi-Cola Co.; AGM-PR, Texaco Inc.; VP-PR, Olin Corp.; VP-PR, Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock Co.; director of communi-cations, U.S. Department of the Interior, and deputy assistant press secretary, The White House. He holds a bachelor of science degree from Columbia University, major in public relations. mailto:bobkelly@TNI.net Visit:http://www.prcommentary.com

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Why risk the embarassment when with a little basic PRtraining, you as a business, non-profit or associationmanager can always be ready for battle?

Never again will you fail to d