Reflections – Southern Region Mini Conference in Barbados

IABC Barbados created another piece of history on Friday Sept. 27 when it hosted one of the mini conferences in the Southern Region Conference series.  Due to conflicting commitments at PRMR Inc.  I was only able to take in just a half of this historic event, but by the time I arrived the tone of the event had already been set.

From my enquiries I discovered that Andre Bello, one of the morning presenters had swept away the audience of predominately females, he could have done this on appearance alone but having seen the gentlemen present a while back at another IABC Barbados event, I knew it was not just his charm that had everyone in awe.  Only today I was reading a blog by Drake Baer on Fast Company which explored Sir Richard Branson’s view on hiring, it quoted him as saying that the most crucial part of a hire is the personality. “Most skills can be learned,” he says, “but it is difficult to train people on their personality.”  Bello is living proof that Branson practices what he preaches. Click to Read More

IABC Barbados Host Its First Panel Discussion

IABC Barbados is gathering momentum. Members are trickling in and the organisation will host its first event since its launch this September.

It will be a panel discussion on What Is PR's real function and Who should it report to. Yours truly is on the panel which also features Sara Odle of Cable and Wireless, Debra King of First Caribbean International Bank and Greg Hoyos of GHA DDB.

My take on the matter is that PR is a strategic function which informs organisations decision making process with regards to its relationships. It therefore must report to the most senior executive if it is to be effective. Of course a lot of organisations devalues or undervalues relationships as they cannot or refuse to see the correlation between the relationships they have with their various stakeholders and their success.

Not having a pr strategy is like having cancer. You go along oblivious thinking that everything is fine and then a serious crisis come along and your dead.

Come to the Panel Discussion and here more on this, or check out my paper on the topic later on this blog.

No Time To Blog

Since the launch of IABC Barbados I have been too busy to blog. Sacrilege, according to Christal Mc Intosh, President of the Chapter who has recently made a commitment to blog every day.

Wow!

My PR world is wonderful and my client list is growing. I am working on a number of very public projects, including Caribbean Wellness Day which is in Bridgetown on Saturday, September 13. Cannot promise to blog every day by I will try for at least once a week, especially since I have part two of an earlier blog to complete.

Check out the ad below on Caribbean Wellness Day. Hope to see some of you in Bridgetown

IABC Barbados Launch

The Barbados Chapter of IABC was formally launched last Thursday at Herbert House, the home of the Cricket Legends of Barbados .

The majestic old building, beautifully renovated was an auspicious setting for the occasion. The ceremony was simple. Vice President Development, Richard Thomas was the Master of Ceremonies and he provided the forty plus audience with enough humor mixed with the business at hand to keep this session lively and excited.

President of the Association Christal Mc Intosh gave an address which listed the five main goals of the Association as:
1. To create meaningful opportunities for networking while bringing an end to the isolation in which professionals currently work;

2. To create genuine opportunities for professional development;

3. To create a local community of professionals whose members are committed to a single code of ethics;

4. To create a platform in which business communications speak with a single united, credible voice; and

5. To demonstrate to business leaders how public relations and corporate communications practiced professionally, can enhanced all those desirables such as corporate reputation, stakeholder trust, productivity and profits.

The featured speaker was the Corporate Communications and Marketing Manager of the Barbados Light and Power, Stephen Worme. Stephen took an unusual route towards heading the communications area at Barbados' monopoly power company. An engineer by profession, he has become respected as a honest voice for all the island's power crisis. Stephen gave an excellent speech about his experience, his relationship with the media, and his dream for the profession locally.


A delightful wine and cheese cocktail followed the speeches.

Barbados - IABC's Newest Developmental Chapter

Christal Mc Intosh, president of the Barbados Public Relations sent the following note to members this weekend:

Hi everyone,

We've done it!

The IABC international board has formally approved our application to set up a Barbados Chapter.

We have achieved this in the unbelievably short time of about four weeks. I believe it's because of the large number of people who showed up for our initial meeting on May 8 and expressed their interest and support. On behalf of the Board of Directors of the Barbados Chapter, I want to thank you for being there.

For the next two years, IABC Barbados will enjoy "developmental status". This means the IABC appreciates that we are on a learning curve and will give us some time to find our wings. We have to use that time to prove our commitment to becoming a fully-fledged chapter.

You can help us do that by becoming an IABC member now. Membership in this association will be one of the best investments you will ever make as a communications professional. And that membership is yours to keep no matter where you end up living and working.

At this early stage, I want to stress that being a member of BPRA will not automatically entitle you to membership of IABC Barbados with all of its privileges. The two are not interchangeable, and only a paid up membership will admit you to IABC Barbados (iabc.com/join/).

DOWN IN THE TRENCHES

While we were awaiting formal chapter approval, the board of directors you elected has not been idle. We have been meeting every Thursday evening for several hours to come to grips with our various responsibilities and to scope out what we have to do quickly to get up and running.

We have also put together a tentative schedule for professional development and networking opportunities over 12 months, starting this August. However, we haven't got every topic and event nailed down, because we want to hear from you rather than making all decisions on our own.

This is why we have also developed a short survey that you will find attached and in the online forum for download. It will provide us with much needed demographic profiles of our target market and how best to cater to their needs.

Please complete it and return it by e-mail to our co-Vice President of Professional Development, Vicki Olton: vicki.olton@gmail.com. It will help us enormously.

We are also working on how best to market the IABC and to whom. We know that there are many more communication professionals out there besides all of you who showed up for our first meeting.

And there are lots of people in allied professions – such as HR, printing, photography and graphic design – who are valid potential members. We are digging to uncover them, in both the corporate and public sectors and we would appreciate any leads you can provide us.

We plan to hold our inaugural meeting as a registered IABC chapter on July 3 at 6:00 p.m. at Herbert House on Fontabelle. By then, I trust that many more of you will have become IABC members. We will keep you posted about the format and content of that meeting, as soon as we have finalized the details.

Again, thank you for your support. And if you haven't already joined up, do it now!

Membership Fees

Membership in this association, which has been set at US $231 if you include the one-time $40 application fee, will be one of the best investments you will ever make as a communications professional. And that membership is yours to keep no matter where you end up living and working.

Barbados' Business Communicators Board 2008

VP Administration, Petal Barclay Smith; VP Professional Development, Richard Thomas; Executive Vice President, Pamala Proverbs; President, Christal P. McIntosh; VP Membership/ Marketing, Cliona Donohue; VP Finance, Fay Best; and VP Communications, Lynette G. Taylor. (Photo compliments PBS Communications)

Hello IABC

Well we have made the first step! After a successful meeting of a good mix of Barbados' pr stalwarts, mid-career professionals, newbies, and individuals interested in the profession, a board of management have been chosen to do the work to get the Barbados Chapter of IABC off the ground.

Judette Coward-Puglisi, president of IABC Trinidad and Tobago did a fantastic job telling of the Trinidad experience and helping to guide the meeting into making solid choices for the vacant board positions. She told the communicators that her chapter was founded on the principle of the 3 Cs - Content, connections and credibility. She said that Trinidad's membership of 80 in the first instance had grown in two years to about 370 and that the Chapter was actively podcasting, blogging, hosting a website, conducting conferences and ongoing educational forums for members. The Chapter had also received a "Certificate of Excellence" from IABC for its outstanding performance.

Judette spoke of some of the common universal concerns of pr persons which helped forged the backbone of her Chapter's coming together - 1. CEO not valuing our work 2. Building relationships with the media and forming a body to bridge the gap. 3. The issue of measuring ROI and 4. Accreditation.

At that end of the night yours throughly had become the Executive Vice President and President Elect. Our good friend Christal Mc Intosh who was mentioned in the earlier post is the President. Other members of the executive are:

• Petal Barclay-Smith - VP Administration
• Lynette Taylor -VP Communications
• Cliona Donohue - VP Marketing/ Membership
• Fay Best - VP Finance
• Richard Thomas - VP Professional Development
• Vicki Olton -Co-VP Professional Development

The board has its first meeting on Wednesday.