Ethics in Public Relations

Emma Stefanick

es421018@ohio.edu

It's no secret that when people think of public relations, the first things that tend to come to mind are manipulation, deception and lies. And the public relations industry gets a lot of flack for it too. Every slip up, mistake and cut corner in the business is scrutinized under the public's eye and just about every person out there, believes it is the job of public relations professionals to sell their product, service or client to whatever ends. While most industry professionals don't actually fall into this category, just the mere existence of this belief shows a need for strong, universal ethics in public relations now more than ever. 

To become unethical in the public relations industry is to lose all credibility, and lose credibility is the end of an individual career, and potentially the organization by association. This means that there is no wiggle room when it comes to being transparent. The job of a public relations professional is not to misinform or twist truths, but rather to make the facts of a product or service appealing. If you have something to hide, then you're doing it wrong. 

 

 

Picture source:

https://aryaprblog.wordpress.com/2017/02/04/ethics-in-public-relations/

 

So if transparency is the utmost important aspect of any media relations industry, how do we get there? Transparency encompasses many things, such as telling the full truth, disclosing processes and background information, avoiding deceptive practices, disclosing conflicts of interest and honesty, among many others. To reach full transparency, you have to incorporate universal ethics throughout the workplace. According to PRSA, this means that corporate management must hold people accountable and create an ethical workspace. 

PRSA suggests strong enforcement of ethical standards, encouraging an anonymous whistleblower line, having an outside firm evaluate ethical practices and promoting ethics online. Some other factors that, when eliminated yield better ethics are, pressure to reach unrealistic targets, consistent demands to beat competition, fear of job loss and overlooking small breaches of policy. By just implementing a thorough and consistent ethics training program within the organization, all of these problems can be addressed and rectified. It is often the lack of awareness of ethical issues that creates the most problems within a company. 

Since there is no universal standard for public relations ethics, it is easy to assume that this profession is nothing but a mumble jumbled mess of propaganda meant to progress our own agendas. But public relations on its own is not unethical. This industry holds power and works behind the scenes to influence, change and challenge societal norms. With power comes responsibility and if we don't start implementing ethics programs in our organizations, completing regular training and following a clear-cut disciplinary action plan, then how are we going to handle the responsibility of public opinion? News flash! We can't handle it. That path only leads to abuse of power and, consequently unethical behavior across the board. Unethical behavior starts from the top down, but so does change.