Almanac: Challenges and opportunities for public relations 2022
We look forward to eight of the biggest issues for public relations in 2022.
This isn’t a review of 2021, or even a series of predictions for 2022. Think of it as an almanac, a guide to some of the biggest issues for our profession for the year ahead.
You’ll find eight short essays with links to further reading so that you can check our work.
Google and Meta must not be allowed to displace the internet
Diversity in public relations practice will take more than a generation to fix
Public relations roared back from COVID-19 so why does it feel so tough?
We’ve used some of the noisiest conversations in our community of practice as our guide. You’d be welcome to join us.
If you’d like me to run a planning session or workshop with your team around the issues we’ve raised please drop me an email.
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1. Strategic issues for management and public relations
COVID-19 aside, a series of strategic issues has emerged as an opportunity for organisations over the past year. Public relations practitioners would be well advised to be across these issues:
Data and digital - Corporate Digital Responsibility has emerged as a broad set of responsibilities related to the application and management of data and digital technologies. It has emerged as a critical risk issue for boards considering high-profile failures in data and digital governance, regulatory issues, and data breaches.
Value of the environment - The Economics of Biodiversity: The Dasgupta Review by Sir Partha Sarathi Dasgupta describes how free markets driven by financial metrics are damaging the natural environment by failing to place a value on natural assets.
Carbon as a metric - PR practitioners must measure carbon in the rush to address ESG concerns as a report suggests that the UK is woefully unprepared for climate risk. The PR industry congratulates itself for banishing AVE from awards. It must recognise that carbon is the single most important metric for sustainability.
Artificial intelligence - The UK Government’s National AI strategy outlines a plan to invest in the AI ecosystem, to support the transition to an AI-enabled economy, and to ensure the governance of technologies. It includes a commitment to R&D and initiatives to address skills gaps.
UK industrial growth - Build Back Better is the Government’s strategic plan to support economic growth through investment in infrastructure, skills, and innovation. It was published as part of the budget announcement and is an important read for anyone developing strategies for investment or scaling.
Further reading
Corporate Digital Responsibility, Allegory, 29 July 2021, https://wadds.co/3pHoDDF
The Economics of Biodiversity: The Dasgupta Review, Sir Partha Sarathi Dasgupta, 3 February 2021, https://wadds.co/3GKUt9x
Carbon as a PR metric but who's counting? Stephen Waddington, 16 June 2021, https://wadds.co/3GvW6Yg
National AI Strategy, UK Government, 22 September 2021, https://wadds.co/3rXbedr
Build Back Better: our plan for growth, UK Government, 3 March 2021, https://wadds.co/30cbUA7
2. Google and Meta must not be allowed to displace the internet
The 1990s was a hugely optimistic time for the internet. It promised to dislodge traditional media and enable any individual, organisation or brand to become a publisher. Steve Earl and I captured many of these shifts in organisational communication in Brand Anarchy and Brand Vandals.
Three decades on I’m less positive. The internet itself has been disintermediated by huge companies, notably Google and Meta. These companies have a stranglehold on advertising and have effectively become a tax on small and medium-sized business.
Regulators have been unable to keep up with the changes in media, not just from an anti-competitive standpoint, but also in adhering to ethical standards. In the past year Facebook has proven unfit to regulate itself. A whistleblower revealed that its Instagram service has been proven to promote poor mental health amongst teens.
There’s also a huge threat to the democratic process. Researchers are beginning to understand the impact of Meta’s Facebook platform on Brexit and the US election both directly and through misinformation. That sovereign nations can block services is a twin threat to democracy that provides no comfort. Regulation must surely be inevitable.
A personal goal for 2022 is to wean myself off Meta’s services but I have yet to figure out an effective plan of action. The network effect and friction are strong.
Further reading
Brand Anarchy, Steve Earl and Stephen Waddington, 29 March 2021, https://wadds.co/3DI58Ql
The Four: The Hidden DNA of Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google, 1 January 2018, https://wadds.co/3rZOCsK
Facebook Knows Instagram Is Toxic for Teen Girls, Company Documents Show, Wall Street Journal, 14 September 2021, https://wadds.co/30kgz31
Facebook's role in Brexit — and the threat to democracy, Carole Cadwalladr, 10 June 2019, https://wadds.co/3oLCsS2
3. Misinformation: The internet is a sewer
The Edelman Trust Barometer 2021 reports an epidemic of misinformation and widespread mistrust. Government (41%) and religious leaders (42%) are least trusted while local communities (62%), employers (63%) and scientists (73%) are the most trusted. Search engines are the most trusted form of media (56%).
Facebook took down 1.3 million fake accounts between October and December 2020. It also removed more than 12 million pieces of content about COVID-19 and vaccines which global health experts flagged as misinformation.
A mere 12 influencers are responsible for anti-vax misinformation according to the Center for Countering Digital Hate. They have a combined following of 59 million across Facebook, Google and Twitter. 95% of COVID-19 misinformation was not removed.
Facebook has 35,000 people working on tackling misinformation. It clearly isn’t enough.
Neiman Labs suggests strategies to counter misinformation include downranking, editorial panels, labelling and removal. The instinct of communication profession is to correct and rebuke fake news. Doing nothing might be the best option to avoid triggering a Streisand effect.
Birmingham’s Director of Public Health has taken an innovative approach, asking volunteers to help share the city’s public health content in the fight against COVID-19 misinformation.
Transparency is the best counter to misinformation.
Further reading
2021 Edelman Trust Barometer, Edelman, 13 January 2021, https://wadds.co/31Ho3h6
How we’re tackling misinformation across our apps, Facebook, 22 March 2021, https://wadds.co/3GyVPUF
Shadow bans, fact-checks, info hubs: The big guide to how platforms are handling misinformation in 2021, Neiman Labs, 15 June 2021, https://wadds.co/31MJ9u0
How to reduce the spread of fake news by doing nothing, Neiman Labs, 5 January 2021, https://wadds.co/3DDEk3x
Recruiting an army of local social sharers to drown out the false news, Dan Slee, 30 January 2021, https://wadds.co/31JNYor
4. Levelling up audiences
One in eight people has some form of disability according to the World Health Organisation. It estimates that two billion people will need at least one assistive communication, memory, or hearing aid in the next 10 years.
The PRCA has published guidelines to help communicators improve the accessibility of their communication. It covers content, media, influencers, and events and is packed with practical tools, advice, and case studies.
Most of the tools needed to produce accessible communications are free and readily available. Microsoft has a suite of tools within Office 365 that includes an embedded Accessibility Checker tool, and Microsoft Teams offers live captioning.
Accessibility is a significant area of investment for social networks and media platforms. YouTube added live captioning to streamers, caption translation to mobile, and searchable captions in transcripts. Instagram’s web app makes it easier to upload and manipulate images and add accessibility information.
It’s also an issue of writing style. In To Be Clear: A Style Guide for Business Writing author Philip Collins says business writing has become dreary, boring, and incomprehensible, with jargon, clichés, and nonsense.
Fight it.
Further reading
Accessible communications guidelines published by PRCA, Stephen Waddington, 21 April 2021, https://wadds.co/309Z8Sv
In To Be Clear: A Style Guide for Business Writing, Philip Collins, 3 June 2021, https://wadds.co/31PPAMQ
5. Diversity in public relations practice will take more than a generation to fix
The numbers tell the story. A voluntary UK agency pay gap survey by PRWeek found that BME staff receive 77% of the average pay, while female staff receive 94% of the average pay. 30 agencies submitted data to the project. None of the top 20 agencies participated.
Education and workplace practices are critical to change according to the Creative Industries Policy & Evidence Centre. Socially Mobile launched in July 2021 with the ambition to address the working class gap of 13,500 practitioners in the UK public relations industry.
The Leader Like Me team Advita Patel and Priya Bates has created a database of underrepresented speakers in marketing, media and public relations. A Leader Like Me helps underrepresented women and non-binary people of colour progress in their career.
The Government Communication Service has published a best practice guide to writing about ethnicity, including words and phrases to use and avoid, and how to describe ethnic minorities and different ethnic groups.
Subjects should have an active part in how their story is told to overcome bias. The Institute of Development Studies has published best practice guidelines for inclusive storytelling.
Addressing diversity in the make-up of public relations and in practice, is a long game.
Further reading
In numbers: The PRWeek Pay Gap report, PRWeek, https://wadds.co/31GoIze
Addressing the working class inequality gap in the creative industries, Stephen Waddington, 21 October 2021, https://wadds.co/3EIsCpA
Socially Mobile, Accessed 12 December 2021, https://wadds.co/3yqzSEj
A Leader Like Me, Accessed 12 December 2021, https://wadds.co/3yjVa6y
A Leader Like Me database of underrepresented speakers, A Leader Like Me, Accessed 12 December 2021, https://wadds.co/3oDBLKw
Writing about ethnicity, Government Communication Service, December 2021, https://wadds.co/3oAWL4B
Tackling bias in how we create and tell stories, Natalie Orringe, 15 July 2021, https://wadds.co/3EIulLA
6. Home comforts and office politics
The proportion of people working from home due to COVID-19 doubled in 2020 although it remains a minority. Data published by the Office for National Statistics records that 25.9% of employees worked from home during the pandemic.
The relationship between home and work has been changed forever for office workers. It’s good for flexibility but also makes it hard to enforce boundaries. Productivity hasn’t slipped but that’s because people work longer hours.
Messaging apps light up at dawn and don’t go dark until after nightfall. That’s not a good thing.
Home working makes tacit learning and formal training difficult. It also limits casual conversation and cultural exchanges. We really do miss the conversation around the microwave reheating yesterday’s dinner.
The future of work appears to be a hybrid combination of home and office, however everyone brings their personal experience to the conversation. It’s critical that we listen to diverse voices from the future workforce as we make plans.
Further reading
Homeworking in the UK Labour Market: 2020, ONS, 17 May 2021, https://wadds.co/3IB909u
I’m working from home get me out of here, Stephen Waddington, 4 March 2021, https://wadds.co/3oCG3lt
7. Earned media in flux, owned media ascending
A rise in trust in the media as a source of information during the COVID-19 crisis has been short-lived, according to the Reuters Institute. News media is at the heart of polarised public conversation on issues such as climate, Brexit, and vaccines, weaponised by social media platforms.
Ofcom has launched a consultation to inform its next steps on media plurality in the UK. It is seeking input from stakeholders on specific features of the current news media landscape, as well as consulting on proposed changes to the media ownership rules. Regulation for platforms is also firmly on the agenda.
The UK’s regional print daily newspapers saw circulations fall by an average of 18% in the second half of 2020. The hardest-hit daily was the Manchester Evening News which saw its circulation fall year-on-year by 46% between July and December.
Database vendors are adding newsletter authors to media database. It's a sign of the times. Traditional publications, digital-first outlets and influencers have embraced the format to build stronger relationships with their audiences.
COVID-19 has driven the adoption of newsletter subscriptions and YouTube by investors according to a survey by Brunswick. Company investor relations pages are investors’ most used and most trusted source of information, however presence on social media is also important.
Further reading
Overcoming indifference: what attitudes towards news tell us about building trust, Reuters Institute, 9 September 2021, https://wadds.co/3oFtCWb
Statement: the future of media plurality in the UK, Ofcom, https://wadds.co/30n3EgK
ABCs: UK local newspaper sales hard-hit by pandemic with dailies down by average of 18%, Press Gazette, 24 February 2021, https://wadds.co/3rVDgFY
Digital Investor Survey 2021, Brunswick, 18 March 2021, https://wadds.co/3rVZgR5
8. Public relations roared back from COVID-19 so why does it feel so tough?
Here's the commercial. Wadds Inc. supports agencies with issues related to growth and sustainability. This agency market is our home.
COVID-19 has seen an explosion of new public relations agencies in the UK. The Wadds Inc. COVID-19 UK PR Agency Startup report explored what has driven this burst of entrepreneurial activity. It’s a hugely optimistic and powerful legacy from an awful period.
Agencies no longer need to be based in London to access talent and clients, if indeed they ever did. A shift away from the capital by agencies is likely to be a second order effect of the pandemic. We are going to track the number of practitioners working outside of London each month to see if this becomes a reality.
The 2021 version of PRWeek’s annual Top 150 UK Consultancies table is a story of the impact COVID-19 has had on the sector. It shows that aggregate revenue earned by the Top 150 agencies was down 4.3% to £1.36bn in 2020 compared to £1.42bn in 2019.
Meanwhile PRovoke Media’s ranking of the world's top public relations agencies in 2021 told a story of innovation and resilience. The data reflected the UK market. Overall, the industry shrank by 4% but is expected to recover strongly in 2021.
The PRCA PR and Communications Census 2021 tells a story of the industry recovery. A recent poll of business leaders by the CIPR predicted a boom to come. The industry has roared back but the data masks the sheer exhaustion among practitioners of operating at pace in extraordinary circumstances over the past two years.
Look after yourselves.
Further reading
COVID-19 UK public relations agency startup report, Wadds Inc., 27 May 2021, https://wadds.co/3DFA8jQ
PRWeek Top 150 overview: Revenue slides, but optimism reigns for 2021, PR Week, 20 April 2021, https://wadds.co/3DHo3e2
2021 agency rankings: Resilient global PR industry declines 4% amid COVID-19 pandemic, PRovoke Media, 13 May 2021, https://wadds.co/3oBFqIS
The PRCA PR and Communications Census 2021, PRCA, 8 December 2021, https://wadds.co/3m0nztw
Two-thirds of businesses planning to recruit or hire PR in coming months, CIPR, 8 December 2021, https://wadds.co/33sizHL
About Wadds Inc.
Wadds Inc. is a professional advisory firm for agencies and communication teams, founded by Managing Partner Stephen Waddington.
We engage with clients around a manifesto focused on change, sustainable growth, working better and smarter, teaching, leadership, and community.
We are proud to work with agency clients including Blackhouse Media, Clearly PR, Don't Cry Wolf, Lynn PR, Miramar Group, Reuben Sinclair, SourceCode, Story Comms and Vixen Labs.
