The Consultancy Management Standard III (CMS III), for which ORCA van Loon Communication is currently preparing to be audited, clearly indicates which companies are committed to qualitative and ethical work. Therefore, CMS III is not only a seal of approval for clients, but also a guidance for employees.
As a part of this self-reflection, we focused in-house on the topic of ethics. And anyone who discusses ethics in public relations can’t avoid the German Council for Public Relation(DRPR). As a member of the DPRG and GPRA, ORCA van Loon Communications is committed to various ethical standards. Their compliance is reviewed by the DRPR as an organ of voluntary self-regulation. These standards include the contents of the historical industry codes Code d’Athène (1965) and Code de Lisbonne (1978). In addition, there are ethics guidelines, which the Council itself has released in 2012 in a communication code , as well as various Council guidelines. Modern challenges, such as in online PR, are also addressed here.
Also, some companies provide their own manuals or guidelines – so does ORCA van Loon Communications.
Is that all there is to it? We have asked!
It is clear that there are some ethical guidelines. But what relevance do these guidelines have in daily work? And are there any open wishes?
Our small internal survey among ORCAs in Hamburg, Berlin and Munich is based on the European Communication Monitor 2020, which asked more than 2,000 people about ethical challenges. Here it was found that around 64.8% of respondents had faced at least one ethical challenge in the last twelve months. This is almost identical to our result of 64.5%. Thereby, 44.4% of the ORCAs said they were most likely facing ethical concerns in consulting situations. This is the top score, followed by situations in project management and budgeting (37%) and media contact and issues around social media (33.3% each).
Which scenarios cause discomfort?
To specify this statement, we provided a number of scenarios and asked the participants to mark those that would most likely lead them to have ethical concerns. The unbeaten score with 95.8% agreement is the scenario “Advise customers whose products and services I myself view critically to negatively”. However, if a large group of the public perceives the products and services of customers critically to negatively, only 29.9% considered this to be a reason for ethical concerns.
Also the ORCAs see the use of bots to generate followers and positive feedback on social media critically (70.8%). In the European Communication Monitor, 67.6% rated this as “extremely” or “very challenging”. “Using sponsored social media posts and sponsored articles on news sites that look like regular content” is considered as a scenario where a third of the participants would have ethical concerns. The remaining scenarios each get approval from 16 to 29%. To remain methodically correct: Third-party variables may also play a role, so we can’t draw any conclusions about why respondents decided for or against the statement. Whether they do not see any ethical problem in the respective scenario or simply have no work-related touchpoints with such activities – or something else entirely – is not for us to say.
Which medicine helps?
Through the survey, we wanted to identify the challenging scenarios, but also get to know what solution strategies exist and how we can improve here. Only in this way can we develop as an employer and support our employees with ethical concerns.
So, what do ORCAs use to answer an ethical question when they are uncertain? The answer: the advice of colleagues, followed by experience from past situations and gut feeling. These are the most important sources. The response categories “Written regulations within the company” and “Industry codes” are almost on a par but far behind the previous ones. This leads to the assumption that the exchange concerning a specific situation is more important than general behavioral tips. Nevertheless, more than 90% of participants said that these five solution strategies were sufficient for them. In addition, the respondents indicated their own internet research and research among opinion leaders whose opinions are valued.
How can we offer support as an employer?
Sufficient solution strategies therefore seem to exist. However, do the ORCAs have any open wishes regarding ethics in PR or their own activities? This is something else we asked in an open question. The results were a wide range of issues that are the responsibility of both the industry and us as a company:
- A frequent and open discourse on the subject of ethics in PR, especially when it comes to gray areas
- Workshops to increase sensitivity towards the issue
- The ability to choose whether to take projects without being sanctioned or scrutinized for the decision
- Strict guidelines from the top management, which are also communicated to customers
- Have the courage to refuse, even if it hurts the business
- More honesty and transparency from organizations
- Increasing the quality of professional journalism
- Stronger punishments for ethical violations, and not only reprimands
Within this diverse mix, we can’t shape all the issues ourselves – but we can have an influence on some.
And that is what we want to work on. The next team meeting on this subject is being planned: What is our focus? How can we become better? With the format “self-test”, we have already gained important insights concerning corporate culture and home office , which have enabled us to shape our corporate development together.
By the way: the amount of time an ORCA has spent in the communications industry had no significant impact on the assessments within the survey. Nor did Covid increase the number of ethical challenges.
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