The utter heartbreak and horror of this week's tragedy at Grenfell Tower in London beggars belief. This should never, ever have happened. We live in a world where buildings can and must be safe, fires can be contained and danger properly averted. It should not have been possible for such... Read more →

In business, we have a wealth of information available to us on leadership. From Harvard to Oxford there are tomes filled with guidance designed to develop those in leadership positions. Yet here we are. Brexit vote complete and a whole country is now 'steered' by a coop of headless chickens.... Read more →

For years now I've been struggling to get practitioners to use video (yes I know I'm using text here but this is a text-based place). It has been an uphill struggle but I'm happy to say that more than a few of them are having a go now. So I... Read more →

The reality of public relations practice for me is simple - what we do is build and sustain the relationships we need in order to maintain our licence to operate. The three pillars that support this activity are understanding, communication and action - put simply, listen, speak and do... I’d like to suggest that it isn’t just the technology industry that needs to be uncomfortable - it’s high time that public relations got really uncomfortable about what it does and how it does things in order to progress. Read more →

I've been intrigued by female colleagues grumbling about International Women's Day. One said she was always taught that if you put your mind to it, you could do anything you wanted to and that having a 'women's day' actually marginalised women. I'm sure that if you are fortunate enough to... Read more →

The murders of 12 people at the offices of satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in France yesterday have left 12 families bereaved and bereft. In Egypt, Al-Jazeera journalists are still held in jail.Worldwide, in 2014, 61 journalists were killed. Everyday, around the world, people are being killed for speaking out, for... Read more →

There's been much commentary on the Fonterra botulism scare and the subsequent reputational meltdown since the company broke the news of the contaminated whey just a fortnight ago. Heads have started to roll - first Gary Romano and now two other managers - and there will probably be other management... Read more →

As the mobile phone is replaced in its ubiquity by the wearable or implanted device, the question every public relations professional should be asking is this: how ready are you for the technology waiting around the corner and the change it will bring to your organisation? Read more →

Earlier this month, the United Nations Committee on Food Security met in Rome. Among the many grave warnings they issued was one concerning the effect of extreme weather on the United States' crops and grain reserves - extreme weather that, when described, was a lot like today's Hurricane Sandy. A... Read more →

The beginning of August saw Pacific Fibre close its doors after valiant attempts to finance and construct a second cable to secure New Zealand's connections to all things web. At the moment we have only the Southern Cross cable to keep us going, which to me seems utterly foolhardy -... Read more →