Tag: Blog

100. Pledge completed

Posted on by Neha Goyal

What are we “putting down” when we “put it down on paper”: a current of thought, a torrent of emotions, the first incisions of a decision?

Eight months back, when I started my post-graduation program in Public Relations, the first thing we were told was- ‘You all have to write 100 blogs within 10 months’. Trust me I couldn’t sleep that night as my thoughts were filled with how am I going to complete this task. The person who hesitates and avoids writing, how is she going to complete this? Initially, it looked impossible to me as prior to that I never wrote blogs. Still while writing my first blog I took a pledge to complete a hundred blogs within ten months.

After taking that pledge, there was no turning back. Today, here I am, completing my hundredth blog in eight months. Well, it wasn’t an easy journey for me where I wrote weekly blogs, monthly book reviews as well as did a 60-day blog challenge. In my 60-day blog challenge, I use to write one blog every day for 60 days and two blogs on Sundays. To some, it may sound easy, but let me tell you it wasn’t as easy it sounds.

Like the life of a PR professional, life in SCoRe (School of Communication and Reputation) is challenging and every day is unpredictable. It was hard for me to write daily with my assignments, presentations, back to back classes and volunteering work on weekends. Still anyhow I managed to do it to keep up my resolution of completing the challenge, the pledge that I took and most importantly not backing off from my own words.

The majority of times we had to decide what we’ll write for our blog posts and daily coming up with a new topic was a task. Deciding a subject and writing a blog used to get difficult on days when I didn’t know what I should write on or when I was already dying with a lot of assignments.

However, I am proud of myself that I did what I had never even dreamt of and completed a hundred blog posts. While writing these blogs, I explored various topics by reading and writing about them. I shared my personal experiences, what new things I learned, gave my point of view on different things. I won’t say that my blogs are good but it helped me improve my writing skills and communicate with clarity. It also taught me how to be active even after a long tiring day which is highly required in the field of communication.

These blogs, they taught me that one needs to keep pushing and move out of their comfort zone in order to achieve something.

85. New Year, New Beginnings

Posted on by Neha Goyal

I am an aspiring public relations professional who has been studying public relations from the past five months. I am a student of SCoRe (School of Communications and Reputations), where I got an opportunity to meet and network with a lot of people from the fraternity. From day one we have been taught what things we would need to do and what we should do in our profession.

In a few days, the next chapter of my journey is going to begin where I will be working as an intern at Genesis BCW, Mumbai. I am excited about this part of my journey where I will get to learn a lot as a student for one last time. As a fresher in this field, it will give me a closer look at how my career is going to look soon.

I have certain expectations from my internship:

Documentation– From day one at SCoRe we have been told the importance of documentation. Through my internship, I would like to know how we should document things right and what things we should keep in mind. Documenting will help me get a better understanding of what has happened, what is happening and what next we need to do.

Media Relations- In the field of public relations networking plays a really important role and at SCoRe, I have been learning how we should network with people. But through my internship, I want to learn how to approach journalists, how one pitch their story to them and correctly network with them.

Improve my skills- In the past few months whatever I have learned, I would like to improve them. In SCoRe I have learned things like networking with people, writing blogs and so on which I want to use during my internship and get better in them.

During my internship, I will give my contribution to the organisation by always being punctual by meeting my deadlines and reach the place before ten minutes. I will try to contribute by giving ideas when needed, always being proactive and volunteer in things to gain more experience and learning.  

I hope my experience at Genesis BCW to be enriching. I want to stand out and make the most of my time there.  

72. The sacrifice of joy to achieve my dreams

Posted on by Neha Goyal

Life in a city is full of opportunities and extremely fast-paced, exciting and overwhelming. I come from the city of joy- Kolkata, and have recently shifted to the city of dreams- Mumbai. It’s been four months since I shifted here. People say city life is like a life in a briefcase, a compact life. Even when we are staying in a big city we live a very scheduled life where we follow the same routine every day.

Back in my city, my life was not the way it is here. Mumbai is a city that never sleeps and people are always busy working. Like Kolkata, the city is filled with tall buildings, eye-catching lights, and people are always in a hurry. But one thing that cannot be ignored about this city is how crowded it is.

Whom should we blame for the traffic here, people or badly made roads? Even though Kolkata is a pretty busy city, I still see more hustle and competition here. Back at home, I had time to be with my family or friends and relax but here things are different. There are days when I don’t even get time to call my friends and catch up with them, every Monday, I go to college, come back with assignments and only catch my breath on Sundays and sometimes not even that.

The urge which I get here to stay ahead of others is sometimes really stressful but that’s how every day I am learning. I push my boundaries, learn new things, do things that I never thought I could. There is so much to do here every moment that there is no time to sleep or relax. Reading, writing, and learning is helping me grow every day.

The city comes with great career opportunities and exposure that one gets. Not everyone can survive and acquire everything that the city gives. To survive here, people need to work hard, be mentally strong and courageous to face new challenges every day.

67. Power of saying NO

Posted on by Neha Goyal

‘Yes or no is a central dilemma.’

Is it only me or is it with a lot of people out there who feel awkward in saying “No” to others?

“No” is a highly powerful word, which can be offensive and can also be simply, stating what you feel.

I always think that saying ‘No’ to others is kind of like disrespecting them and find difficulty in doing so. It is one of the setbacks I have. One day, my elder brother told me that sometimes I should say ‘no’ when required. As sometimes not saying it can be unfair to ourselves as well as to the other person. He told me, how telling ‘yes’ all the time cannot be easy. Since then, I am trying to work on it.

To work on it, I would say that I have been doing certain things which are helping me to learn the art of saying “no” at the correct time.

  • Communicate properly: One can say no in the right manner by giving the context properly so that it isn’t considered as negative.
  • Clarity of thoughts: One can communicate and deny well when they are clear about what they want to say or do in a particular situation.
  • Prioritise properly: One needs to learn how to prioritise their things and take decisions accordingly. This helps to do what one exactly wanna do without feeling guilty when they say a no.
  • Be confident: One should be confident of their decision that helps them to say no to people regardless of whoever it is. They can communicate with confidence and also give respect to that person.
  • Use of correct words: When a person is unsure of what they should do in a particular situation they can use ‘maybe’ or ‘will let you know’. It helps to have time to figure out and decide properly in certain situations.   

In the end, we should remember that saying ‘no’ is our right. It doesn’t mean you are being rude to a person. Saying no can be important in certain situations. What matters is how you convey your message without disrespecting anyone. As you are saying no because it either doesn’t go with your belief or your schedule.  

66. Be Courageous

Posted on by Neha Goyal

“A person of courage is also full of faith.”

A courageous person is a person who is willing to fight regardless of whatever consequences or limitations they have to face. They are the people who face their fear, tackle difficult challenges head-on to achieve their goals. It doesn’t come naturally to everyone. It needs to be developed in people by having their goals set and work on it. One can enhance their abilities, break their barriers and be courageous by working on certain things.

  • Be opinionated– One should always stand up for themselves and share their point of view. They should have the courage to give their own opinion in front of people.
  • Try new things– One should always be open to do things which they haven’t done before and be courageous to do it alone. One should have the ability to expand their horizon.
  • Strength in adversity– One shouldn’t be afraid to go against the challenges and should face by having strength and being courageous.
  • Meet new people– One should have the courage to go up to people, talk to them and network with them. It not only helps you to be courageous but also to build contacts.
  • Focus on being positive– Courageous people should be positive and avoid all negative vibes coming in between their goals.
  • Do something that fears you– One should try things which they fear to do. It helps one to overcome their fear and be more courageous in life.
  • Stand up for things– When required one should have the courage to stand up for things which they think are happening and speak up against them.
  • Follow your heart– Passion is what helps to do certain things in life which we are not able to do in general. One should follow their heart which will help to do courageous things and achieve their goals.

As people start working on some of these points, they start getting the qualities that a courageous person should have. People start having self-confidence, get compassionate, have integrity, and won’t be scared to be a leader, follow their intuition and start stepping outside their comfort zone.

I am a public relations postgraduate student, at SCoRe where one of the core values taught to us is to be “Courageous”. The core value taught to us says that we should be ‘Courageous for a rough ride, take initiative, and tackle difficult challenges.’ With each passing day, we chose to act even when we are afraid to do anything new.

59. Crisis & Internet

Posted on by Neha Goyal

The fastest kind of medium leads to the biggest and unreliable crisis. In the internet era, crisis happens more often and spreads faster than that. A story, a rumor or a piece of information posted by someone about an organisation can lead to crisis. Internet can make a crisis happen anytime and anywhere. People accessing information 24/7 and getting news is making communicator’s job more challenging.

 A crisis can become a nightmare for a brand but a negative conversation always cannot be considered as a nightmare. The communicators need to be active all the time to react to decrease the negative comments of people for their brand.

The communicators should be active and have an immediate response for the people who have got anything negative to say about the brand. The team should have a set of individuals to be solution-oriented and ability to connect wherever and whenever. During a crisis, companies need to have a social media post ready to deliver it to the people who are on the internet. Social media or the internet is the fast means which companies can use to deliver their message, even before the journalists will do through newspapers on different days.

During crisis communication through social media, the communicators need to use the correct social media tools and materials at any given time. They should have access to monitoring to get them with the data and insights of the posts to help them make further crisis response. Internet is a two-way communication that requires more of a conversation than a statement during a crisis to keep it engaging. This new dynamic requires corporations to find, engage with, and share ideas with people who are total strangers. Stakeholders looking for meaningful exchange of ideas and information with the audience on digital.

58. Leading not Managing

Posted on by Neha Goyal

‘Crisis plan is likely to fail without the full participation of the board’

During a crisis, the challenge affects people in different ways and there is immense pressure on the employees of a company. A lot of people go through preparations and training yet with all likelihood, things can go wrong. It is not an easy task to make the top-level people of a company, go through the media training yet they should be aware of how important it is to do.

According to the Harvard Business Review, ‘most companies do an inadequate job of managing their reputations in general and the risks to their reputation in particular’.

Many a time crisis gets worse due to the lack of the perspective of the top-level people. Leaders either take the action for the company, makes the situation worse or don’t do anything out of fear. Employees want their leaders to take some action during such situations.

During a crisis, people tend to find the CEOs as the most credible and trustworthy source to give out any information. They know the in-depth condition of a scenario and communicate accordingly. They are highly experienced people who can say and do things accordingly while considering the situation. They can anticipate the crisis much before and can warn their employees against its negative consequences.

Leaders or the CEOs of a firm are the spokespeople of the crisis and their communication with the media and audience leads to positive side effects of the crisis. The question of presenting the right information opens the dilemma between winning hearts and minds and waiting for greater accuracy.  

55. Ram-Allah. Why not Humanity?

Posted on by Neha Goyal

Why can’t we choose humanity?

In my opinion, it was not worth it to fight for a piece of land for so many decades and create religious and political havoc across the country.

We are all aware of the conversation going on around Ram Janamabhoomi – Babri Masjid (RJBM) case for decades. The debate is on all fronts- socio-religious, history and politics. On 9th November 2019 the final verdict was announced on the issue after a 40-day hearing on the petition.

It is a fight that involved a few acres of land in Ayodhya. The issue is between people of the Hindu and Muslim community; where Hindus states that the site belongs to Hindu deity Rama and consider it as his birthplace whereas Muslims state that since there was Masjid at the site which was built by Babar, the land belongs to them.

A lot of stories revolve around this place and a lot of them have been made since the time the riots started for the Ayodhya plot. Since the dispute started things were out of control and people were fighting against each other.

Supreme Court led by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi delivered the politically-sensitive verdict on 9th November stating that a temple will be constructed on the disputed land and five acres of land has been provided to the Sunni Waqf Board for building a mosque in the prominent site of Ayodhya. The court came across as a rational voice in the country because of the Sabarimala temple case in the past, which made people trust their decisions. As history has shown us, the start of the issue can affect a lot of things or work as a victory for the ruling party.

All this dispute, riots and debates that stretched over for such a long time, that in the end has made me think was there any need for it? I am a girl, who has always been taught that humanity is bigger than any religion. Why didn’t people think of coming up with a decision which would have involved something for the people living in that city rather than two religious communities fighting with each other?

It was just a man-made building for which people were fighting. It didn’t require a temple or a mosque but the humanity of the people.

Now when the verdict is out, all I hope for is that this generation learns from the mistakes of our elders and doesn’t repeat it. And take decisions that will be right as humans.

India, Think Different!

53. Being Curious

Posted on by Neha Goyal

‘The entire world is a laboratory to the inquiring mind.’

Curiosity is the desire to learn new things, how they work and understand certain things in details. It can manifest in different ways like to know about people, their lives, some old stories or current affairs. It is the accumulation to get knowledge on certain things. It helps to generate opinions on certain topics.

Curious people are the ones who ask a lot of questions and like to explore things. They don’t shy away in asking questions and are active to broaden their horizons. Being a curious person helps in a lot of professions like public relations. It helps a person to do well in a job as they ask questions, learn from others, look for ways to do better as they understand and then do things.

 Why being curious is important? Being curious helps us in the following ways:

  • Learning– Being a curious helps us to learn a lot of new things and widen our horizons of understanding.
  • Relationship building– It helps in strengthening and building new relationships with people as curious people tend to ask a lot of questions. This shows their interest in them and builds a warmer relationship.
  • Expand our empathy– Curious people tend to talk with people outside of their circle. They don’t shy away in asking questions and understand about them and their experiences and their views on certain things in the world.
  • Be inquisitive– Knowing about others perspectives, approach, and opinion to certain things helps a person do things little differently and come to come up with new answers through other people’s thinking.
  • New ideas– It helps to come up with new ideas when we start learning about new things and exploring them. Without curiosity, one can miss up with many new ideas.
  • Excitement– Curious people are always asking questions and exploring things in life which makes their life more exciting. They are always in new things which attract them and be adventurous.  

Curiosity is a choice which one makes by learning deeper about certain things and seeing their true significance. Curiosity is an important process of learning at every age. One should keep an open mind, ask questions relentlessly, consider learning as fun and should keep reading.  

I am a person who asks a lot of questions and feel that life without being curious and asking questions is boring.

Fun Fact: Curiosity is a car sized rover designed which is on Mars as a part of NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory mission.

52. Fashion to Forever: Evolution of the century

Posted on by Neha Goyal

A brand that went from Fashion 21 to Forever 21, a retail business chain founded on 16th April 1984, by Korean husband and wife to attract the market of Korean community that existed in America. It sells different sorts of women wear, accessories and various other women’s products. The brand believed in selling trendy clothes at a low price to be successful.

It has evolved its business in all these years, globally with the opening of around 623 stores all around the world. It has been offering products in the lowest range possible and making stylish apparel for everyone from the age of 16-24. It has always been known for its trendiest style of fashion clothing and to make one’s buy worth their money.

The brand has also subsidiaries brands that have grown in recent times to expand the business and generate more revenue and give people a huge number of choices in clothing for them to make their trend. E-commerce is booming and the traditional retail market of Forever 21 is struggling to adapt to these changes.

Globally it has been a hot spot for teens to shop but now has listed into its 11th chapter of bankruptcy and closing almost its international business in 40 countries around the world.

In India, when the brand was launched it was considered as one big thing as it offered all the fashion trends we have seen in Hollywood movies which grabbed the attention of every teenager. The branding of the clothing lines always involved collaborations with famous style icons and models who had their own clothing lines.

The bankruptcy which Forever 21 was facing globally didn’t affect the Indian market and people still prefer buying the products from this brand.

It might be the end of an era in a lot of countries due to shut down of this fashion hub but it will always be one of the exhilarating and vibrant fashion paradise to all the Millenials from across the globe.

Yet with the bankruptcy and controversy faced by the brand makes me think that ‘will Forever 21 is going to be there forever?’

Reference: https://www.livemint.com/companies/news/forever-21-india-business-will-not-be-impacted-by-bankruptcy-filing-11569849131133.html