Public Relations: Agony Vacancy

Every now and then, I receive notifications from Job Street on vacancy for Public Relations or Communication Executive post. Don’t  speculate, just that I subscribed to that website long time ago so, they still email me any updates for vacancy.

Finally, I take the initiative to check my mail today and dear lord,  it is flooded by porno spams, Groupon deals and job vacancies from Job Street.

The job description and job responsibilities do really somehow make me laugh because it is so diplomatic!

They usually like to use these phrases: fast expanding..handling international brands..looking for passionate and motivated people, develop press release…develop media relations….

To the young ones who are about to step into public relations industry, please don’t be deceived by the diplomatic words in the job description because the job description doesn’t describe the whole picture of the insurmountable responsibilities in PR.  PR is either hell or if you are lucky enough, it will be your paradise.

If I ever have a PR agency or I have the blessing to take control of the recruitment, I won’t be that diplomatic, instead, I’ll be a meanie and bitchy. I’ll write the job description or rather tips for the potential candidates in this manner:

1.  Capable to churn out three press releases and three speeches in a week
2.  Able to sleep for four hours and drive down to airport to catch the earliest flight and return on the same date on the latest flight and go to work the next day
3.  Outdo GPRS or Google Map because you can’t rely on them all the time
4. Take Google as your best friend – trust me, Google does wonders
5.  Good in crapping intelligently – you’re a spinner, so you have to make people believe that the Sun rise in the West and not East
6.   Do not say don’t know – either you really don’t know or you don’t have effort to gain more knowledge
7. Be positive for the ruling government even if you pro-opposition as you will deal with many government officials and ministers along the way
8. Fasih bertutur dalam Bahasa Melayu as Malay media is huge in Malaysia
9. Good health – skipping meal, meeting the datelines with running nose and sleep late are the norms, so make sure your body can endure it
10. Can endure hot scorching sun for hours with make up and formal dress
11. Good in remembering faces and names
12. Do not offend people even they are nasty as somehow you will work with them someday
13. Know your public and school holidays well as you don’t want to have an event during the holiday season as most media will be on leave
14. Be social network friendly – seriously, please don’t end up yourself in Paradigm Mall fiasco
15. Be polite as politeness does work sometimes
16. Don’t be proud on your good command of vocabulary  but be humble and unleash your good ideas-I know good command of English will look good on you but those high and difficult vocab will annoy the editors – just make it simple and nice
17. Know the celebrities well – seriously, you don’t want to recommend a controversial artiste to endorse a brand right?  
18. Able to make endless phone calls to endless people for the same question “Are you coming for our event”?
19. Lighten up sometimes – I know the job is hard and formal sometimes but take a little space to make fun sometimes
20. Imagine yourself as the Goddess of Thousand Hands or a squid as you need to multi task a lot like handling four accounts at the same time
21.  Be two-faced