Ethical Standards of Public Relations

 Holly Friedel 

hf004717@ohio.edu

Ethical Values 

A lot of my blog posts have surrounded the importance of honesty and transparency in the journalism world. As I investigate and learn more about public relations, I have discovered the importance of a similar moral compass in the industry. I will admit, originally I thought it was a field where you represent and say what a company wants you to release to the public for their own benefit, and where you, as their representative, obtain a greater profit because of it. As I have matured, I have found how important it is to be an honest public relations company, and not only please your client, but follow the responsibility of sharing truth and accuracy to the public, essentially following an ethics code.

                                                                    Getty Images

Top to Bottom, not Bottom to Top

Large corporations are no stranger to disobeying and plain right ignoring ethical standards; and as we have seen in many cases, specifically looking at the Murdoch scandal, we see the people at the top blaming their employers for ethical concerns questioned and judged by the public. But, it is ultimately the role of the boss to be aware of activity by employers, particularly if illegal activity is being conducted within companies. So, as we see in the Murdoch case, the public did not show aggression towards employers, but the man in charge of it all, showing society blames the top, not the bottom. In many cases, employers break rules due to pressure from owners, CEO's, managers, etc. Pushing deadlines, sales, and personal agendas can create an environment where employers feel they have no option to but to break the rules, and those rule breaks can take down an entire empire. 

The Solution

Their are many things large and small corporations/companies can do to create an ethical policy and business overall. I find it would be very beneficial for large companies to engage in a focus on ethical standards, because even today we see the biggest company in the world, Amazon, face backlash on certain ways the company is run and treatment of employers. Advice for the companies would be: 

—Provide examples of ethical disasters and as a corporation discuss the issues of it while also discussing what should have been done.

— Bring in outsiders. Someone with no connection or bias to a company can review the morals and ethical standards of a company and potentially point out something that went unnoticed from employees within. 

—Create a plan of how you want to see change within the company, and provide open forums where employers can comment on the issues they see or are first hand dealing with.