Public relations and management

Hundreds of you contributed to my PhD study on how corporate communications and public relations support management over the summer of 2025.

Thanks to your involvement, we’ve built one of the UK’s largest datasets describing the strategic contribution of our practice.

Ups and downs, uncertainty, insecurity and jeopardy are part of the PhD journey. I’ve shared them all with you via social media. But the signals and the stories from the data couldn’t be clearer.

There are six very clear areas of insight.

1. High performance – the conditions and competencies required for excellence in practice. Best practice occurs in around a fifth of organisations, and we know exactly what it looks like.
2. Contribution and value – the areas and conditions where practice excels and is called upon by management.
3. Structural challenges – issues with reporting lines, investment, and integration within management and other functions.
4. Capability gaps – the areas where practitioners excel and where they don’t; no surprises that planning and measurement are high on the agenda.
5. Cultural barriers – misconceptions about public relations, corporate communications, the role of organisational communications, and its potential.
6. Professional preparation – the uptake and impact (or lack of) of qualifications, continuous professional development, and formal means of accreditation.

The next stage is a series of interviews with senior practitioners and the managers who set their objectives and budgets.

I now have no doubt that this project will make a significant contribution to corporate communications and management knowledge and practice. But more than that, I hope it contributes to interventions and policy change to shift the elevation and value of the corporate communications function and public relations practice.

Thank you for your time, your insights, and your trust. This work exists because of you, and I look forward to sharing more.

Stephen Waddington
November 2025