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Jack O'Dwyer is editor-in-chief of the J.R. O'Dwyer publications. He can be reached at at jack@ odwyerpr.com

April 9, 2002
IABC, PRSA REVAMP TIES
TO RAGAN, PRW
 

The International Assn. of Business Communicators is rethinking its many ties to Ragan Communications, which has conferences, seminars, books, publications and an awards program that are competitive with IABC.

PR Society of America, after years of co-sponsoring conferences with Ragan and letting PR Week (U.S.) use its mailing list, has put an end to all such co-sponsorships and will no longer rent its list to PRW.


Red Riding Hood had the sense to realize that the wolf was in disguise.

Both trade groups are losing money and wonder why. IABC is in particularly bad straits, having lost $2.1 million in the past three years.

They obviously never read the tale of Red Riding Hood, who had the sense to realize at the last moment that the hairy figure in her grandmother's nightgown was not her grandmother (who had been eaten).

Besides the $1 million loss on its abortive e-business "TalkingBusinessNow," IABC last year saw its conference, seminar and awards income fall $369,412.

It is in stiff competition with Ragan, which puts on a dozen two-day workshops and nearly 50 one-day seminars a year.

The two-day seminars are expensive, running from $795 to $1,295. IABC puts on about two dozen conferences and seminars. Both IABC and Ragan target the same audience–employee communicators.

PR Journal
Ragan published Ragan's Public Relations Journal, a bimonthly, in 1999. The title, Public Relations Journal, had been used for 50 years by PRSA until it discontinued publishing the monthly in 1995.

IABC and Ragan are each putting on two-day conferences in May and the contrasts between the two meetings are eye-opening. Both cost $795.

Ragan expects 400+ at its meeting in Chicago while IABC and its co-sponsor, the Council of Communication Mgmt., expect 70 at a meeting in Los Angeles.

If you look at the Ragan conference, it sounds like an IABC event.

Charles Pizzo, 2000-01 IABC chair, is moderator of the opening Monday panel May 13 from 8:30 to 9:45 which has PR executives from five blue chips–Boeing, Walgreens, Marriott, Baxter and Unisys. He then talks from 10:45 to noon on "workplace safety and security issues."

Shel Holtz, one of the architects of TalkingBusinessNow (paid $83,330 as a consultant to IABC in 2000) and who put on about 18 full-day workshops for IABC in 2000, speaks from 1:30 to 3 p.m. about the intranet. He also speaks for an hour on Tuesday on how intranets can be used to hold videoconferences and send audio files. He will give one of three half day post-meeting seminars which are an extra $295.


PRSA will no longer co-sponsor conferences put on by other entities such as Ragan's Media Relations conference. It will continue to take sponsors for its own conferences.

Les Potter, 1991-92 chair of IABC, will talk on how attendees can help employees to be recognized as the most significant asset of an organization.

Ned Lundquist, current IABC national board member, will talk on how the U.S. Navy's leadership techniques can be adapted by attendees. He is a retired naval captain.

Robert Holland, past national director of IABC, will tell attendees how to find an "influential manager" who will help their communications programs. Potter and Holland are also giving special morning sessions on "How to network without feeling silly, insincere–or both." Besides the post-conference seminars, there are three pre-conference one-day workshops at $395 each.

Suzanne Salvo, former president of the Houston chapter and currently an IABC district director, will give advice on how to take photos of the CEO. She has her own photography business.

The IABC/CCM meeting sounds dull by comparison. There are no special sessions on how to network; no pre and post-meeting workshops, and no awards lunch.


Only one issue of Fraser Seitel's What's Working in PR and Corporate Communications was published in 1995 by Ragan. Seitel at that time was publisher of PRSA's quarterly Strategist and was writing front-page articles for its monthly Tactics. Seitel at the time, said he would have quit writing for Tactics if "What's Working" were successful. WW was a 16-page newsletter offered at $189.

The only speaker familiar to IABCers is Wilma Mathews, a national board member from 1999-2001. None of the Ragan "stars" such as writers Dave Murray and Steve Crescenzo are on the program. No wonder only 70 are expected.

However, we did some research on some of the speakers and found that the opening address will be given by Robert Mallett, senior VP, corporate affairs, Pfizer.

A lawyer, he was in the Clinton Administration as Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Dept. of Commerce from 1997-2001. He should be an interesting speaker.

The IABC website, meanwhile, lists three Ragan and three Melcrum (U.K.) publications for sale. The website of Ragan does not list any IABC publications while the Melcrum site does. IABC publishes 14 manuals, books, reports and kits, which are listed in its IABC Store under "Knowledge Centre Resources."

IABC is being further weakened by the departure of Gloria Gordon, editor of Communication World and an 18-year veteran of the group. CW, once published monthly, is now published every other month. Ragan offered to take over the writing and publishing of CW, remitting profits to IABC, but the group turned this down.

Gordon is leaving in September to start her own consulting, writing and research firm. She is working a little over half time until Aug. 1. Natasha Spring, director of the IABC Research Foundation, will be executive editor of CW and Naomi Mandelstein, senior editor.

CW has been outsourced to Douglas Murphy Communications, Richmond, Va. It will manage editorial traffic, art, direction, production, printing, mailing and ad sales.

PRSA, after a long and deep love affair with PR Week, has decided that PRW is a competitor. Of course it is–with PRSA's Tactics and Strategist publications and the Silver Anvil awards.

PRW is put out by Haymarket, the biggest private publisher in the U.K. with a couple of hundred million pounds in sales. With $11.5 million in sales, Ragan is more than twice the size of IABC. The company last year purchased two "Bits & Pieces" inspirational publications. About 250,000 copies of the booklets are printed 14 times a year.

Trade associations should not be involved in any way with the trade publications covering them. It's a conflict of interest for both. The trade groups have lost lots of advertising and conference/seminar dollars to these private companies and can ill afford to lose more.

 
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John Santoro, President, CCM (4/15):
Hello...I read your story on the upcoming CCM/IABC Conference in Los Angeles, and I beg to differ with your assessment. Quite frankly, we were not looking for "Ragan Stars" or even for the people who typically populate (and repopulate) these conferences. We were looking for new voices, and we have found them for the LA conference.

Second, comparison with Ragan doesn't make sense. Ragan is a for-profit organization mounting big conferences for people of all levels, including people new to the field of corporate communication. I have a lot of respect for what Ragan does, but our Los Angeles conference is aimed at the more skilled, higher-level practitioner. We are deliberately keeping this conference smaller to provide more opportunity for learning and interaction. We don't need "awards lunches", nor do we need to teach people about taking pictures of their CEOs. We'll put the time into sharing experiences on how we influence the strategies and policies of our organizations, and how we measure the results.

You are right about Robert Mallett, SVP of Corporate Affairs at Pfizer, being an interesting speaker. At age 40-something, he's served in the Clinton Administration, been city manager of Washington DC, and now is a key leader of one of the world's largest public affairs departments, including one of the world's most successful media relations groups. He's shaping up as a super keynote to a provocative, high-value conference, (and I'd say that even if he wasn't the leader of my group at Pfizer!)

George McQuade, media director Cerrell Associates, Inc., PRSA-LA Board member (4/12):
You wrote about what most of us in the PR and Employee Communications biz have been saying for years.

I spoke on the same national circuit (for Ragan Communications at the Annual Corporation Communications Conference in Chicago, which was always co-sponsored by IABC) with both Charles Pizzo and Shel Holtz, however the only compensation I recieved was a hotel room and free seminar registration. But how can you attend if you're speaking?

As for the list, it happens locally, too,where former presidents of various PR associations whether it be PRSA or IABC take their membership lists with them and add it to the next club they
join.

Last year, it got to be irritating, because ironically every time PRSA would put on a local chapter event (in LA), the competing associations would have one similar, different panelists, but one week before! Coincidence? I don't think so. And often nonmembers would receive faxes of events of associations. Is it because of this crossover sharing of member lists?

Maybe its the new 21st Century Spam Fax?


 

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