#CIPRSM to wrap up
New Future PR Practitioner Forum to launch in 2016
The CIPR Social Media Panel (#CIPRSM), one of public relations’ most progressive industry working groups, has announced that as a result of making significant progress in “integrating digital and social media into all aspects of training, education and policy at the CIPR” it will formally close as a CIPR standing committee, after stating this achievement as the final goal of the Panel’s work in January 2014.
A new Future PR Practitioner Forum, launching in January 2016, will be tasked with moving forward and developing the work of #CIPRSM. This group will exist to support the CIPR in effectively embedding the wider impact of digital technology, innovation and change in PR across its products, services and policy, as well as identify key future trends.
Since #CIPRSM’s formation in April 2010, the member-led group has been responsible for creating and sharing more than 25 different best practice and skills guides across all areas of social and digital media, from Google Analytics to Wikipedia to Social Media Monitoring, Social Media and the Law and Social Storytelling, all of which have been extensively used and read by thousands of CIPR members and non-members alike.
#CIPRSM also led the production of CIPR.TV with the support of Markettiers4DC, the CIPR C-Suite podcast series and the Social Short’s series of events; the last of which will be held this evening in London on ‘Social Talent’, led by Walmart UK’s Senior Director of Marketing, Innovation and New Revenue, and #CIPRSM member, Dom Burch.
Their crowning achievement as a working group came in 2012 when Wiley published Share This: The Social Media Handbook for PR Professionals and the follow-up Share This Too (2013), both of which were ranked as Amazon Europe #1 Marketing bestsellers.
I was privileged to be the founding chair of the panel. My successor was Stephen Waddington who went on to be CIPR President in 2014. Social Media and the work of the panel was initially a fringe activity, but has been at the core of the CIPR for the last couple of years when Dan Tyte and Gemma Griffiths continued to innovate as co-chairs. The CIPR has led innovation in the industry and will continue to do so with the new forum led by Sarah Hall, who is already recognised as a thought leader in the future of PR practice.
In January 2014, under new Co-Chairs Dan Tyte MCIPR and Gemma Griffiths FCIPR, #CIPRSM publicly set out an ambitious strategy to make itself redundant once it was confident that the CIPR was in position to take forward the task of guiding Members through the task of integrating social and digital communications technologies and strategies in training, education and policy at the CIPR.
It’s without doubt that in April 2010 when the Panel was formed, the CIPR was in dire straits in terms of its education and information provision on social media best practice for CIPR members.
Fast-forward five years and the CIPR has gone a long way to becoming a social first organisation. Whether you’re a practitioner with decades of experience or someone interested in entering the industry, thanks to the work of the Panel, CIPR now has a relevant and robust evolving suite of information and insight to improve your practice.
Tens of thousands of downloads and shares of our best practice guides show that the advice was in demand. Panel members lead CIPR-badged training courses across the UK and overseas, attended by hundreds of practitioners year-in year-out. We’re hopeful that through our work PR professionals feel much more confident that they’re equipped with the knowledge to lead social media strategy in their organisations or for their clients.
This leaves the Institute in a fantastic place to take forward the Panel’s drive and energy to ensure that the PR profession – through the CIPR’s leadership – is fit for the future.
The new Future PR Practitioner forum, commissioned by Rob Brown FCIPR, CIPR President 2016, is set to be led by Sarah Hall Chart.PR FCIPR, lead editor and creator of the #FuturePRoof project.
This group will have the broad remit of working across the CIPR’s existing structures, with an initial first target of successfully future-proofing the CIPR Chartered PR Practitioner programme in year one. The new group will be taking expressions of interest from members to join the Forum in early January 2016.
The CIPR is committed to ensuring public relations is recognised as a management discipline and to widening understanding of the role it plays in achieving organisational success. The Future PR Practitioner Forum has been established to help us achieve this goal.
Drawing upon the thinking of the #FuturePRoof community, as well as practitioners and academics within CIPR membership, the remit is to look at how PR professionals can secure their place as trusted advisers to the CEO, the skillset this requires and how the Institute can best support practitioners as they progress throughout their career.
The forum will also identify the opportunities for public relations and how practitioners can best capitalise on these.
Notes to editors
About the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR)Founded in 1948, the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) is the Royal Chartered professional body for public relations practitioners in the UK and overseas. The CIPR is the largest membership organisation for PR practitioners outside of North America. By size of turnover and number of individually registered members, we are the leading representative body for the PR profession and industry in Europe.
The CIPR advances professionalism in public relations by making its members accountable to their employers and the public through a code of conduct and searchable public register, setting standards through training, qualifications, awards and the production of best practice and skills guidance, facilitating Continuing Professional Development (CPD), and awarding Chartered Public Relations Practitioner status (Chart.PR).