Playmaker’s Blog

 

Strategic Communication: Simulating a Ukraine Migraine

November 13, 2019

SIMULATIONS ARE ESSENTIAL in developed industries and professions. They help pilots, doctors and first responders execute with precision — not simply because practice makes perfect but because experimentation can be the better teacher. So why not simulate communications? And the strategies that drive it? At The Circle conference in Budapest, Hungary, I had the honor of engaging […]

What’s Behind Strategic Communications? A Periodic Table of Course.

July 23, 2019

From Bledcom, the premier communication theory symposium held annually in Bled, Slovenia, a presentation by Playmaker Systems’ Alan Kelly of his ground-breaking Taxonomy of Influence Strategies: “Reality Check: Presenting and Assessing a Periodic Table and Decision System for Strategic Communication” This video includes critiques from CCO veteran Herbert Heitmann and theorist Andrej Drapal.  

Soap Box Heckler: PR is Not a Profession

April 16, 2019

Last week at the 2nd Annual IPR Bridge Conference I asked a panel of PR scholars if they were comfortable with the title of their talk, “How Public Relations Theory Matters to the Profession.” In my experience, the term “profession” is too easily and often breezily attached to a trade that shuns licensure and seldom suffers for […]

Strategies for White House Reporters: Don’t Fight Trump, Play Him

January 7, 2019

When seasoned anglers hook a big one they know better than to fight the fish. Against their instincts they know to let ‘er run, to let their catch beat itself through impulse and exhaustion. In my experience most journalists lack this sensibility and training, and from my perch in Washington, D.C., this seems particularly true […]

Edward Bernays Foresaw Our Fakery. That’s Why PR Throws Him Under the Bus.

December 15, 2018

An excited member of the PR trade recently tweeted, “Strategic Communications and #PR is an ethical practice. We’ve come a long way from Edward Bernays.” She was referring to the publication of 16 new principles of ethical practice by Global Alliance, a collective of PR practitioners, academics and associations. And she was throwing the father […]