Ian Nash writes for EMPRA

A problem Every time I take a few days out for a break or to report a conference, I return to the office to find my computer screen screaming at me: Systems Administration: Mail Box Full.

Seconds later it yells: Account closed, contact Systems Administration. With upwards of 300 emails on a high day, this is inevitable with even the largest memory on the Microsoft network. And the cause of the problem? Not SPAM, not official mail, not even welcome mail.

It is a pile of PR gumpf from colleges, pressure groups and hopeful communications agencies offering “ground-breaking” news, “sensational” campaign launches and “exclusive” stories. Unfortunately, the contents reveal anything but ground-breaking, sensational exclusives. They are largely parochial out-of-date tales, with unusable photographs attached, which voraciously devour the memory and destroy my patience.

A colleague tried to solve the problem by carrying a Blackberry everywhere, allowing him to review and spike or save messages as they arrive – anytime any place. As a result, his once leisurely newspaper-reading daily commute from the suburbs has become a frenzy of finger-stabbing at the delete button.

The age of mass communication has rapidly become an age of miscommunication, thanks to the convenience of modern technology. If you do not recognise yourself in this description, you should. It is not just emails. We all need to think hard about how wastefully dependent we have become on web-related communications.

Just think. If I ration each email to a maximum 20 seconds attention, one fifth of my working life would be spent on the task. Therefore, if you are to sell me your story by email, you have a maximum of 40 words – two sentences – that must appear in the preview window before even opening the email. And this is a perfectly reasonable request. After all, that is the basic skill of intro writing that all good journalists have mastered. It has, therefore to be a basic skill all good press and communications officers will have.

Before returning to this, I have a question:

What makes a good story?

A while back, Miranda Yates, then press officer of Lewisham College phoned me to ask what the TES was doing on the Government’s demand for financial literacy to be part of the 14 to 19 curriculum. She reminded me that the Financial Services Authority had criticised the lack of public understanding of financial products and services. Ministers were swift torespond.

When I said we were planning to do something, she spoke of Lewisham’s pending announcement – with two other colleges – about the creation of a finance academy. Moreover, she said, the FSA and city banks had agreed to give aspiring accountants and burgeoning bankers work experience. The TES could have it first. The result was a big news story in The TES FEFocus and a major feature and front-page picture in a 16-page TES special report. Miranda had demonstrated the essential qualities of good PR.

She:
1. Was ahead of the game

2. Knew her target audience and readership of the papers on her patch

3. Linked local colour stories to big national initiatives

4. Used direct personal communication before the web

5. Targeted stories – providing real exclusives for individual papers.

What if the story is Bad News?
When Bexley College had a disastrous report, with a grade 5 for Leadership and Management in 2004, the principal Bridget Boreham’s communications press and media adviser urged her to offer it exclusively to the TES.

Few principals would agree to such exposure. But Bridget did. In an 800-word interview, she put her side, challenged the inspectors and, with the support of the governors, spelled out what action they were taking. Two years on, after a remarkable change of fortunes, she has written in FE Focus (11th August) a well-considered criticism of inspection reforms as spelled out in the FE white paper. Her adviser was Aidan Relf, Media Spokesman for the Association of Learning Providers (ALP). He judged perfectly:

6. The art of pre-emptive action
7. The value of nurturing press contacts

8. The need to trust one’s press contacts

9. The importance of a good, honest(disarming?) approach

10. The value of bold initiatives

11. The importance of reputation

Reputation
Which brings me to a central point – reputation and Sir Andrew Foster’s review of FE? Possibly the key recommendation for FE communications staff in his report is the one relating to reputation. He points to the need to “improve marketing and promotion of colleges and the achievements of learners and staff”.

People who fail to understand the media or Sir Andrew’s intentions, unfortunately, have wildly misinterpreted this. When I asked him what he meant by “reputation” in this context, he said: “It is as much about being honest and open about your shortcomings as it is about promoting the best achievements.”

The lazy way is to blame the media for the reputation of FE. That, of course, is the last resort of the naïve, incompetent and ill-informed.

The first rule of the good PR should be: “Leave nothing to chance”. That is the problem with IT and rapid mass communication. An email that opens with nothing but “Please find attached a press release about an award to Britain''s largest FE college” might hit the spot, but only very occasionally.

A good checklist
If you observe the 11 bullet points in the two stories above, you maximise your chances of placing a story in the TES, Guardian education or other specialist newspaper or magazine. The same rules apply to TV (with the added stunning visual) and Radio (with memorable soundbite).

However, there are other barriers even then. To get a story into the TES you need to ensure:

* Key staff and managers speak directly to journalists – don’t just be their conduit, trust them*

All key questions from journalists are answered
* The questions journalists fail to ask are covered*

That we are contacted “before” the event – that cannot be stressed too strongly
*Never say “no comment” – say you need to make enquiries and will come back

You may think that these points are blindingly obvious, but many PRs seem blind to them. Those five points are the most common problems my colleagues and I find.

Finally, it is always worth remembering what Lord Northcliffe, founder of The Mail, said. When asked: What is news? he replied: “News is something that someone, somewhere wants to suppress. All the rest is advertising.”