Denver Public Relations: Pushkin PR

Milestones

by Jon Pushkin under

The Romans, who literally stuck huge blocks of stone in the road to measure distances, were the first to use milestones. The Romans were also fond of raping and pillaging, so they are not my favorite role models when it comes to historic achievements.

Nevertheless, the end of May and the beginning of June mark some important personal and business milestones for Pushkin PR and me. In June, I will celebrate 15 years since I started Pushkin Public Relations in the spare room of my home on South High Street. On a personal level, my wife and I are moving out of that High Street home after 15 years into a new home in another old Denver neighborhood.

Coincidentally, our moving day is May 31, the day my father passed away 21 years ago in 1991. And this Memorial Day weekend, the Denver Folklore Center celebrates its 50^th anniversary. For me and many other transplanted folk singers, the DFC was my first Denver home, my first Denver family, and a major influence on my life.

Each of these milestones brings back a lot of memories and brings up a lot of emotions. Deciding how to recognize them and putting their meaning in perspective is not easy. Should I be celebrating? Reflecting? Choosing a meaningful way to honor the occasion? Or do I just sit back and say wow?

Like other Denver public relations pros, Pushkin PR helps clients recognize milestones all the time. Groundbreakings. Ribbon cuttings. Grand openings. Anniversaries. New leadership. Retirements. Mergers. Major achievements. We mark these events with stones in the road, then we document them through social media, traditional media, video and written word to communicate why they are significant to the audiences our clients want to reach. Deciding how to recognize these moments for our own business is another story. How should Pushkin PR celebrate 15 years in business? Should we throw a party? Donate services to a nonprofit? Just sit back and say wow?

I find myself struggling with those questions as well as with the personal milestones coming at me all at once this month. I’m looking for clear answers but I’m not easily finding them.

Last week my sister told me that my nephew was getting engaged. Just what I need, another milestone to reflect on. Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy for him. I’m also thinking about how happy my parents would be at this news and wondering how so much time went by so fast.

Whether we are facing business or personal milestones, the way we choose to recognize them says a lot about our individual culture and values. We should make those decisions in a thoughtful way so that their true meaning will be apparent to all who pass our stones in the road.

The kids are all right

by Jon Pushkin under

At a recent eTown show in Boulder it was evident that I may have been a little too quick to judge the next generation. It’s easy to look at young people walking down the street with their headphones, texting, unaware that they are about to crash into me and get the idea that they are completely oblivious to the world’s problems. It’s easy to see them texting while driving and get the idea that they are just a little self-absorbed.

Every spring, like most Denver public relations firms, I get a barrage of emails from people looking for internships or jobs. Some are recent college grads and some are still in school. Many of them blast out a generic cover letter addressed to some impersonal target like Dear Hiring Manager, accompanied by a typo filled resume with no relevant experience for the position they are seeking. They want to move to Denver and they need a job. They are dying to work for a firm like mine but it’s obvious from their email that they just inserted Pushkin PR at that point in the sentence where they deleted the name of the last firm they sent the very same email. C’mon man! A little homework would be nice.

So the eTown show the other night was refreshing. Inspirational even. As eTown’s host, Nick Forester told the audience, maybe you came here tonight a little stressed out, a little discouraged, a little worried about what’s going on in the world today. Well we can relax now, because the kids are all right. The show featured the Infamous Stringdusters and Zak Heckendorf, amazingly talented young musicians with some serious chops playing innovative, creative, original acoustic music with conviction, passion and a social consciousness that is as much a part of their music and the flurry of notes they were playing.

On the same show, Nick also interviewed Zak Podmore and Will Stauffer-Norris, two recent Colorado College grads who spent four months paddling down the entire length of the Colorado River to document the dire situation facing millions of people in seven states if we don’t do something to reverse the major damage our towns and cities are doing to the river. Their passion and conviction inspired the audience as well as the musicians they shared the stage with.

At the end of the show I told Nick that he’s right. I felt bad when I walked in the door but now I feel much better. Everyone in the next generation is not shallow and oblivious, just the ones sending me their resumes. There is hope for the future. We’re okay. We can take a deep breath and relax. The kids are all right.

Spring Training

by Jon Pushkin under

While my Denver public relations colleagues were spending time at the PRSA Western District Conference last weekend, I spent a few days in Florida taking in some Spring Training games with two of my favorite cousins.

Spring Training is a time for hope. Everyone is in a good mood. Everyone gets a fresh start. Managers are smiling, players are signing autographs and obscure Minor Leaguers are convinced they have a shot at making a big impression. Even Yankee and Red Sox fans are nice to each other. It’s warm, you’re near the beach, and you’re on vacation. What’s not to like?

Seems like everyone deserves a little Spring Training. We all need a break from the bad news and a little dose of sunshine. But sometimes life gets in the way. Mets fans, for example, are not too excited about Spring Training. For them, Florida is an endless month of back pain, twisted ankles, sore shoulders and mysterious diseases nobody else seems to come down with. There’s the daily drama of the players they can no longer afford and the team owners facing a massive Madoff lawsuit. As the Mets get ready to celebrate their 50^th anniversary, they are preparing to field their worst team in 50 years.

Communities can use some Spring Training too. Take Ybor City, for instance, a Tampa area historic district where you can find a mixture of Cuban and Italian culture, vintage cigar factories and a lot of New Orleans flavor. In Ybor City, everything is a blend of different flavors. Cigar bars. Coffee bars. Pizza joints serving Cuban sandwiches.

Unfortunately, Ybor City has seen better days. Empty storefronts, empty restaurants, and a pervasive sense of resignation tell a less than hopeful story about a once thriving business and tourist district. The city fathers could sure use some good PR. They might start with a nice little spot at the end of the block called The Bricks of Ybor, where you can find strong coffee, good music, a friendly staff and a great happy hour.

Bricks is Ybor City in a nutshell. It’s young, hip, quirky, laid back, a little wild but not too full of itself, and it already has a well-established sense of the importance of tradition. It’s solid, like its name. You can hang out and use the free WiFi or come back later for movie night. It’s just what the area needs to bring in new life and new energy to a long neglected business district.

Bricks represents the breath of fresh air that we all need to find in our lives and our work. Sometimes we go looking for it and sometimes we just stumble upon it. We all need a spark, the sort of excitement and hope that Spring Training brings baseball fans each season. Where we find it and how long we can hold on to it is up to us.

Really?

by Jon Pushkin under

After an exhausting, year long effort that included canvassing every professional in every corner of the planet, PRSA finally came up with a new way to explain to all those skeptics what the heck PR people actually do for a living.

It’s the first update since 1982 to the generally accepted industry definition of public relations. A lot has changed in those 30 years but not our profession’s inability to do for us what every Denver public relations pro tries to do for our clients: come up with simple, clear, concise and consistent messages that communicate who we are, what we do and what we stand for. And why someone else should care.

Members of PRSA and other professional organizations were asked to submit their definitions. Out of 927 submissions, three finalists were selected:

“Public relations is the management function of researching, communicating and collaborating with publics to build mutually beneficial relationships.”

“Public relations is a strategic communication process that builds mutually beneficial relationships between organizations and their publics.”

“Public relations is the strategic process of engagement between organizations and publics to achieve mutual understanding and realize goals.”

And the winner is, number 2. No one should be surprised that a profession that lives safely in the middle of the road chose the middle definition. It is, however, disappointing that PRSA picked such a textbook, bland and unexciting way to describe what we do.

When clients ask what PR is, I tell them public relations helps you uncover your story, decide who you want to tell it to, and figure out the best way to deliver your story to those audiences in a compelling way. If I have to explain to them that it’s a management function, I’m in trouble before I start. If I need to resort to industry jargon like calling an audience a public, I’m just not a very effective communicator.

I felt the same way about the social sciences when I majored in history. I felt that calling things like history and sociology a social science was phony nonsense from a discipline with a real inferiority complex. I didn’t want to be a scientist. That’s why I majored in history. Now I’m a communicator. I don’t want to be a bureaucrat. I just want to help my clients communicate.

So once again PRSA, you have failed to solve our biggest problem. It’s not about a definition. It’s about a brand. Maybe in another 30 years you’ll figure that out.

Here’s looking at you Kid

by Jon Pushkin under

Gary Carter died yesterday. The Hall of Fame catcher was the heart and soul of the New York Mets 1986 World Champions, the unquestioned team leader on the field and in the clubhouse.

Carter died from brain cancer, a disease I know very well since my father died from it 20 years ago. In those 20 years, not much has changed in how they treat people with aggressive tumors like Carter’s. First they tell you the bad news. Then they give you some hope that there are treatment options. Then you learn that the treatment options just extend your life a few months before the tumors start growing again. Then you start facing reality.

Carter was the kind of player you want on your team. He never gave up, never stopped believing. He was known as Kid, because he was always smiling and always enthusiastic about the game, like we all were when we were kids. For that he was mocked, taunted and criticized by everyone except his teammates, who understood what kind of man he was.

In the first game Gary Carter ever played for the Mets he hit the game winning, walk off home run in the 10^th inning. In Game 6 of the 1986 World Series, the Mets were down three games to two, and down two runs in the bottom of the 10th. There were two outs and nobody on when Carter came up, and most of his teammates were already in the clubhouse realizing they just lost the Series. With two strikes on him, Carter got a hit. When he got to first base, he told the coach there was no way he was going to make the last out of the World Series.

Here's what I learned from Gary Carter:

Be real, be yourself

Carter was the Kid. Always smiling and always fired up. He always played hard. He was a vocal leader who got in your face if you screwed up. While the rest of the Mets were partying and cheating on their wives, Carter was getting his rest and working on his swing. A lot of players and fans thought that was an act. They thought he was a self-promoting jerk. They thought he was phony but he was just being himself and he was comfortable with who he was.

Never quit

With two outs in the bottom of the 10^th in Game 6, Keith Hernandez was in the club house having a smoke. He was thinking about getting drunk that night. That’s when Carter got the hit that started the winning rally. Some players just know how to seize the moment.

Laugh

The lasting image of Gary Carter for many fans is one with him laughing. He always had fun on the field. It was always a kid’s game for the Kid. It was always full of pure joy.

You can’t win them all

There are some battles you are just not going to win. Like brain cancer. It will kick your butt no matter how strong or how positive or how tough you are. Sometimes you just have to accept the inevitable.

If I were the Mets PR counsel, I would be planning a ceremony to retire Carter’s number. It’s no secret the Mets could use some good PR. Met fans don't have much to cheer about these days but seeing number 8 on the outfield wall at Citi Field would be a constant reminder that beyond all the money and greed there is still a lot of good in baseball. And a lot of fun.

Here’s looking at you Kid.

Listen up!

by Jon Pushkin under

One month into 2012 and I’m already singing the blues. Like that Harry Nilsson song from Midnight Cowboy, “Everybody’s talking at me. I don’t hear a word they say.” Or as Dylan said, “You go your way and I’ll go mine.”

This may be good news for therapists and mediators, but for Denver public relations pros, this is a bad trend. Public relations is about listening, which is becoming more of a lost art every day.

Communication is a two-way street. We can’t develop a strategic communications plan without feedback. But how can we understand the feedback we’re getting unless we are willing to listen? If it just sounds like a lot of noise it won’t make any sense.

In January a Republican congressman from Colorado Springs boycotted the State of the Union Address because he was certain he would not like what he thought the President was about to say. He stopped listening even before anyone said anything. But instead of being ridiculed, he’s considered the new normal by many.

Does anyone expect anything will get accomplished in Washington or in many state legislatures this year? Nothing happened last year, nothing will happen this year and maybe nothing will happen next year. Like boxers, we’ve gone to our separate corners. We only listen to our chosen channels. We only hear the voices of people who think exactly like us. We walk through the valley of nonstop election cycles with our blinders and our headphones to comfort us.

The decibel level is only getting worse. Negative campaign ads dominate the airwaves. Accusations are hurled without regard to truth or consequences. The only ones happy about this are fact checkers and advertising sales people. Talk about job security.

Four years ago, PRSA came out with a statement calling for civility and fairness in election campaigns. Nobody listened. Even so, our job as PR pros is to take that same stand again. Our counsel needs to always be on the side of reason, compassion, respect, tolerance and understanding. Our job is to convince our clients, employers and colleagues that they cannot be successful without a healthy dose of those values. We can disagree as long as we do it respectfully. We can be sure of ourselves only after we consider another opinion.

Listen up people! The best musicians are the ones who never stop practicing. The smartest people are the ones who never stop learning. The most admired individuals are the ones who treat others with respect. Let’s lower the volume and not be too afraid to listen. Even if we don’t like what we hear.

Lifers

by Jon Pushkin under

A new year always begins with promise, hope and opportunity. It’s a fresh start, but that optimism is hard to imagine for a lot of people.

Like the homeless guy named Larry who lives a block from my office near the Cherry Creek bike path downtown. He’s a self-sufficient guy who keeps all his belongings in a little cart he hitches up to his bike and covers with plastic bags. I see him there when I walk my dogs by the creek. He was always with his companion, a big furry husky. My dogs like to greet his dog and that gives me a chance to slip Larry a $10.

Just before the holidays, Larry said the police had taken his dog away and euthanized him. It may be a new year but things are not really looking up for Larry. They are also not looking up for the woman who called my office last week looking for the Homeless Prevention Fund, which is part of Checkoff Colorado. She was desperate for rental assistance and you could hear the fear in her voice. Heartbreaking.

These kinds of stories really get to me. Like Woody Allen said in Annie Hall, " I can't enjoy anything unless everybody is. If one guy is starving someplace, that puts a crimp in my evening."

Which leads me to the point of this article. For a change, this article is not about public relations. It’s about inspiration. When I need something to believe in, when I hope for a fresh start, I think of the talented, creative, almost famous troubadours who make music because the music is reward enough. They are the lifers.

Toward the end of The Last Waltz, Robbie Robertson explains why The Band is breaking up. He says the road eventually catches up with everyone and he does not want to keep testing the odds. He says the road caught up with Hendrix, Joplin, Hank Williams, Elvis, and so many others, and he does not want to join that list. At some point in my life I completely understood what Robbie meant. I lost my endurance and got off the road too. Every musician I know understands this, but the special ones have the passion to be undaunted and unafraid.

That’s why the lifers are my heroes. Ramblin’ Jack. Tim O’Brien. Mark Diamond. Mary Flower, Pete Wernick, Barry Mitterhof, Harry Tuft, and so many others I’m lucky to call friends. They inspire me to believe that anything is possible.

So to all the cats who ever played bad gigs in crummy bars for loud drunks who never listen, here’s lookin’ at you, kids. Best wishes for a happy, healthy, safe and prosperous 2012.

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Milestones

The kids are all right

Spring Training

Really?

Here’s looking at you Kid

Listen up!

Lifers

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