The new PR brain changes in superficy, it updated but didn't change

The practice of Public Relations is one of which you constantly have to go with the flow. It could be the event you are setting up with your company, the social media backlash you got after one of the influencers you picked or simply an employee acted up. But going with the flow in PR is not only about learning how to deal with stress, unexpected outcomes and pressure. It also involves mastering new trends and new tools before newer, fresher digital-native blood comes to take the power from you. We are seeing influencers and celebrities gaining more power, the media losing power, and the artificial intelligence of social media taking over trends and becoming the new platform to prioritize.

While working for the London Fashion Week this year, being overly worried to "do good" I realized that I may be a little older than I imaged. Me, a millennial? I reluctantly accepted to use the iPhone my tech-savvy digital-obsessed older sister working in expert e-marketing pushed me to have. I subscribed to twitter in 2017 with a fear of "not knowing if I am using it right" therefore, not using it at all. I have been on and off Snapchat and I never got around to it. I am struggling with a hundred and eighty followers on Instagram for an account that is supposedly "professional" photography. What I really am is the sort of "millenial" that only ever uses Facebook (and whats app because the format is similar to msn messenger, and therefore understandable to my generational peers and myself). The thing is, I am not a digital-mastermind. I still carry the work culture and predispositions that my older sister and parents taught me to have: do the best you can do because you are new, you are a beginner and your employer need to find a reason to keep you.

So there I was, overthinking the press release I had to correct and send to my superior. But truly, what I failed to see, was that my superior was probably younger than me. And when I moved to another "department" to help with photography for the digital team, I was, I have to admit, shocked. My superior was twenty-one years old. And she was a master of social media and fast-pace working. She never shook, never blinked, she was an excellent team player and a beautiful manager (in the way that she knew exactly how to treat people, and that never had to involve being bossy, superior, commanding, cold or passive-aggressive). 

If the social media brain outlines a major change in how to practice public relations, a few skills remain the same in order to work in public relations; the practitioner needs to have qualities of patience, a fast-paced organization, and a smile to put on no matter what.

References

PRMoment. (2017, March 15). The evolving PR Brain. Retrieved April 13, 2017, from PRMoment: http://www.prmoment.com/category/pr-insight/the-evolving-pr-brain