Ethical PR

eth⋅ics   – the rules of conduct recognized in respect to a particular class of human actions or a particular group, culture public relations – the actions of a corporation, store, government, individual, etc., in promoting goodwill between itself and the public, the community, employees, customers, etc. The combo: Public relations ethics the rules of conduct recognized in promoting goodwill between a corporation, store, government, individual, etc. and the public, the community, employees, customers, etc. Defining PR ethics is the easy part; balancing journalist and the PR practitioner is the hard part.  In the newsroom, we receive a hefty amount of press releases. It's in my best interest to read through all of the releases and decide which deserve coverage, and which can be set aside. But which ones deserve the time of day? Is it just the non-profits that are deserving? Or maybe I'll only pick the most timely. Or maybe it's a slow news week and I'll assign stories based for almost all of them. Maybe just the ones where people addressed them to the correct person and spelled their name correctly.  That, throughout my time working at The Colonnade, has been one of the hardest decisions. I'm concentrating in public relations and journalism, so I know how badly people want to have their press releases run in the paper or have the event or organization being promoted. It's rare that we ever run a straight release, but it does happen on occasion. More than likely, I'll look a few things: 1. If it pertains to campus. The Colonnade prints solely for GCSU community, so if knowing about it doesn't benefit campus, you can consider the release tossed. 2. If it's a non-profit. It's part of a newspaper's social responsibility to let the public know about different opportunities to become involved to make the world a better place. 3. If the release is sent to the proper person. (Usually, if it's sent to the wrong person, I won't see or hear about it anyways.) 4. Copy editing. No one will take a press release seriously if there are typo's. Especially in the lead.