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Environmental scanning technique
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Introduction Environmental scanning refers to information use and acquisition with regard to organizations relationships, events and trends in its external environment aimed at helping an organizations management in planning the organization’s future activities (Albright, 2004; Aguilar 1967; Choo and Auster, 1993). With regard to public relations, environmental scanning refers to the gathering of information on the reaction and opinion of the public towards the organization. Most organizations engage in environmental scanning because it provides them with a better understanding of external forces of change and aids at identifying emerging issues, drawbacks and situations which enables them came up with strategic measures to change their policies, procedures, services, behavior and products in order to benefit the organization and to adhere to the public’s interest (Cultip et.al, 1987). According to Sutton (1998), environmental scanning is aimed at identification and avoidance of surprises, acquisition of competitive advantage, short-term and long term planning improvement and identification of opportunities and threats (Albright, 2004). To be more specific, environmental scanning is a method used for information identification, translation and collection with reference to external influences into constructive decisions and plans. Most notably, there has been a debate on the strengths of environmental scanning and its specific limitations in relation to public relations (Conerlissen (2007, p.99) opines that environmental scanning helps organizations through “analyzing the organization’s position and identifying emerging issues that may have significant implications for the organization.” However, L’ETang (2008, p.86) opines... ... middle of paper ... ... Bond: Public Relations Education and the Practice. The Report of the Commission on Public Relations Education. Available at http://s3.amazonaws.com/ppt-download/2006-report-of-the-commission-on-public-relations-education-1195223272668565-1.pdf?response-content-disposition=attachment&Signature=554iyiPqbDSlLhYQNEsRd66KCjg%3D&Expires=1331580717&AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAJLJT267DEGKZDHEQ March 15, 2012. Wei, C.C. 2001. Information Management for the Intelligent Organization: The Art of Scanning the Environment.Medford, NewJersey.: Information Today Inc. Weick, K. E. 1979. The social psychology of organizing (2nd ed.). Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley. White, J., & Dozier, D. M. 1992. Public relations and management decision making. In J. E. Grunig (Ed.), Excellence in public relations and communication management (p. 91-108). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
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The discipline of public relations is a modern profession which has been in existence for only close to a century; however, it has already taken an important role in the fields of business, government, entertainment and non-profit organizations including educational institutions and healthcare organizations. Public relations professionals are required to have excellent organizational, interpersonal and communication skills and have the ability to persuade the public. It is imperative for PR professionals to effectively communicate with its public in order to establish and maintain a positive relationship. Furthermore, public relations professionals must have the ability to work under pressure and effectively manage crisis which may have detrimental effect on the company and the public it serves. State purpose of paper and an overview of what will be covered in the introduction
Environmental scanning "is the acquisition and use of information about events, trends, and relationships in an organization's external environment, the knowledge of which would assist management in planning the organization's future course of action." Choo (2001) As explained by Gazzale (2007) all businesses external environment are made up of three facets ": 1) the remote environment (macroeconomic factors including inflation, GDP, interest rates, etc.), 2) the industry environment (barriers to entry, the level of competition within the industry, etc.), and 3) the operating environment (the business's customers, suppliers, and workforce, etc.).
Haag, S. & Cummings, M. (2008). Management information systems for the information age (Laureate Education, Inc., custom ed.). Boston: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.
Middleton, Kent, and William E. Lee. The Law of Public Communication. N.p.: Pearson Education, 2014. Print.
Q1. Grunig and Repper (1992) proposed a model of strategic management of public relations. Sung (2004) commented that the model emphasizes Public relations has a significant role in the process of an organization’s strategic management by identifying stakeholders, publics, and issues around the consequences facing the organization.
Analysis of the external environment is very important for the development strategy of the organization and a very complex process requiring a process tracking and assessment factors and also the establishment of links between those factors and the strengths and weaknesses as well as opportunities and threats. External environment has its complexity and uncertainty. It is obvious that without knowing the environment the organization can not exist. The organization studies the environment in order to secure a successful progress towards its goals.
Environmental scanning is the process of gathering information about events and their relationships within an organization's internal and external environments. The basic purpose of environmental scanning is to help management determine the future direction of the organization (Barnat, 2004). For a business to succeed, it is important to study the business environment of the firm that consists external and internal influences that affect the firm’s decisions and performance (Grant, 2010). Environmental scanning includes the assessment of Macro and Micro environmental analysis.
Today, public relations is a complex profession by thousands of thousands of people all the world to practice. Almost all large and small organizations have their own public relations department or they need to outsource their public relations to a company. Public relations practitioners work for schools and universities, companies, governments, professional and trade associations, hospitals, hotels, non-profit charities, and other else more (Grunig, 2001). Therefore, PR is an important department for organizations.
Public relations is everywhere today. It is a practice that has become an important aspect of any business venture. Whether an organization is not for profit, for profit, or governmental, they still need and desire to communicate their purpose within the community and public relations allows this to happen. There are several publics in which the PR practitioner must correspond with and each requires a different means of communication. Internal publics are inside the organizations such as clerks, managers, and stockholders. "External publics are those not directly connected to the organization: the press, government, educators, customers, suppliers, and the community" (Seitel, 2004). Each public plays a key role in the PR of the organization. The many functions of PR can also be categorized based on what purpose they serve the organization.
Communication is central to an entity’s involvement in environmental affairs. The field of environmental communication deals with this directly, aiming to educate, alert and solve environmental problems we face on Earth. Through strategic and developed communication practices environmental communicators analyze the language and symbols we use to define the natural world. Some of the major components of this sector include environmental news and media, public participation, environmental conflict, risk communication, “green” marketing and campaigning and conflict resolution. Scholars in the field address human responses to the natural world, while attempting to unveil the mask that covers and alters many environmental issues. Environmental communication