Jules Herd, new chair of the Public Relations and Communications Association (PRCA) Council, speaks to Communicate magazine about the main issues in the industry in the upcoming year, her goals for the PRCA, and how the association plans to tackle diversity and inclusion issues.

What do you think will be the main issues in the industry in the upcoming year?

Ha where to start - there are likely to be loads. I think ethics and values are two areas. The Grenfell Inquiry placed a huge spotlight on Portland and Grayling, openly questioning ethical practices. There has also been a huge amount of misinformation this year, so there will be even more pressure to be truthful and transparent in our dealings, especially in the public sector. I think we will see more PR professionals leaving agencies and going it alone as solo practitioners, partly as a result of Covid and the new way of working and partly because the dynamics are shifting based on what PR folks want from life and what companies want from PRs. Data and insights are going to take on a whole new life when it comes to messaging and analysing what does and doesn’t resonate with audiences. As part of this, businesses will be much more focused on ROI with PR increasingly becoming viewed as a sales tool. Finally, the use of influencers will continue to remain a key part of comms programmes and campaigns, with influencer marketing set to become a $15billion dollar industry by 2022. While there are currently specialist influencer agencies I can see more and more PR companies building out their own influencer divisions, offering it as a necessary service and generally investing more in this space. 

Are you optimistic about 2021? What are your goals for the PRCA?

I am extremely optimistic but then I am a glass half full type of person. Don’t get me wrong, I think that 2021 will continue to be a challenge to us all off the back of Covid but I believe that with challenges come opportunities; you just need to know how and where to find them. In terms of the PRCA, I am very happy to be chair – we have a strong council this year of bright, like-minded individuals who collectively want to drive positive change in the industry. My primary goal is to build an effective, empowered and inclusive council that delivers impactful activity which strengthens the reputation of the PR profession. To do this, we need to be accountable, we need to take ownership and we need to deliver results. It’s not good enough just talking about doing things; we need to be active, we need to be present. We have a number of initiatives in place which cover areas like mental health and wellbeing, accessibility and inclusion, and supporting small businesses, many of which have been decimated as a result of the pandemic. I am very confident that working together we will be in a position where the industry and its broad set of stakeholders will benefit from those initiatives. So yes, I am optimistic, and I am excited. 

How will you bring your experience in transformative tech to the PRCA?

One of the many attractions of working with transformative tech companies, a large percentage of which sit in the scale-up space, is the level of flexibility this affords. Given that a number of these technologies are new and changing the game, you can’t always take the usual approach to getting them noticed. A lot of what we do involves lateral thinking and bending the rules – to get people to adopt these technologies you have to change their behaviour and / or mindset. The same applies with the PRCA – it is a fantastic organisation with a great reputation but, as with all trade bodies, there are rules to be followed and rightly so. I hope that my start-up mindset and slightly roguish yet professional approach will inject some alternative thinking and allow us to tackle issues in different ways. 

In what ways can the PR industry achieve a greater female and minority representation?

Isn’t that the million-dollar question? PR in itself is not so bad when you look at male versus female representation - according to the latest census, two-thirds of workers are female (68%). Sadly however, that is not reflected in leadership, with only 13% of women occupying senior roles. With minority groups we have much more work to do – even with the number of ethnically diverse professionals increasing to 12% (from 10% in 2019), this is way off where we want to be. The fact that almost 9 out 10 (88%) managing directors identify as White British, but only around half (54%) of account executives identify in the same way, spells out that there is something going wrong when people start to move through the ranks. That said, I am not really a fan of quotas as I think you can end up hiring someone to tick a box when they might not be the right person for the job, or when it might not be the right role for them, which can be very damaging to the very cause it seeks to promote. Nonetheless, having worked extensively in the music and tech industries, both of which are dominated by men at a senior level, it is massively frustrating that there is not more equality especially as I have been witness to appointments that have been made based on who and not what you know – in many companies there is still very much an old white boys’ club. What’s clear is that we need opinions and experience from multiple backgrounds in order to be able to deliver the best experience internally and externally. This can only be improved if companies make D&I a part of their core values as opposed to it being just an initiative – it needs to be at the heart of everything they do. So how do we deliver this? We need more mentors and role models, we need to be encouraging diversity at the point of education so that the stream of new candidates coming in is much broader and we need more accountability in the workplace regarding people who are seen to be obstructing a culture of inclusivity. To put it simply, achieving equality has to come from within otherwise you just end up paying lip service. 

Has Covid-19 changed PR? If so, how?

Yes, it has, in multiple ways. Let’s start with the massive increase in pay for play. Due to the impact on ad revenues, publications are looking at other ways of monetising their offering which in many cases involves turning editorial into sponsored columns. This is a total pain in the backside for PRs as it minimises opportunities for driving broader traction for clients and can undermine the authenticity of content. We need to think harder and smarter as the advertising and editorial departments start once again working hand in hand. Due to Covid, issues and crisis comms has been pushed way up the list of priorities for companies which can only be a good thing both for the business which now are now adapting crisis planning as a critical part of their strategies but also for agencies who are in a position to add greater value than before and, in turn, monetise that value. Lastly, I think the PR industry is going to see greater competition from other areas of business such as management consultancies which have started to include comms in their remits and which I think will start to build out PR divisions within their practices. With the greater focus on ROI, companies will be looking at how they can maximise spend for the best results and consolidation of some functions is one route to achieving this.