Why business acumen is critical for PR professionals today

0:00When what you're doing isn't having any impact on the business, you really have to question it. If you don't, you're going to start being questioned.

0:08Jason Mudd: Welcome to On Top of PR with Jason Mudd.

0:15Jason Mudd: Hello and welcome to On Top of PR. I'm your host, Jason Mudd with Axia Public Relations. Today, I'm joined by Ron Culp, and he brings decades of experience across government, corporate communication, public relations agencies, and higher education. He now serves as a professional in residence for DePaul University's award-winning public relations program, where he helps prepare the next generation of public relations practitioners. Ron, welcome to On Top of PR. It's great to be here, Jason. Good to see you. I'm glad to be here. I'm glad you're here. So, you know, I was able and fortunate to get accredited pretty early in my career, back when you had to have at least five years of full-time experience.

0:58Jason Mudd: And one of the most rewarding professional development experiences I ever had because I learned so much more about being a strategist, so much more about public relations measurement and planning and strategy, but also the circle of professional peer contacts and connections and friends that I made during that process. So it's a real honor for me to meet you and have you here on our show as we talk about why business acumen is critical for public relations professionals today. Well, let's get rolling. I love the topic. Excellent. Well, real quick, how many books have you written in your career?

1:31So far, I think it's five or six. Some I don't count because they were the equivalent of books, but when they went online way back when, they probably would have qualified as a book because they had a lot of pages. But unless I see it in print and students are reading it in the classroom where now they're all reading it digitally. Right. And I don't really consider it a textbook. You know, years ago, unless it was in print, I didn't consider it a textbook.

1:57Jason Mudd: Gotcha. Gotcha. Okay. Well, good. Well, I'm excited about today's topic, business acumen. It's critical for the public relations professional. It probably always has been, but especially today. And, you know, I'll start off with just a quick anecdote. I remember a new chief communications officer came in to one of my clients and he had inherited an internal team. His immediate reaction was, this team is bloated. There are too many people here. So one of the first things he did was interview each employee and he asked them two questions or three questions. What do we do? How do you impact that?

2:30Jason Mudd: And the third question, I'm sorry, what do you do? How do we make money as a company and how do you impact that? And he said, you know, he immediately had a list of those who got it and those who didn't. And so that's how he began to kind of groom down his team because he thought that the team was inflated in the moment. That's always stood out to me, one, because I wouldn't want to be that person that shows up to the meeting and doesn't understand the business side of things. And as we advise clients, Ron, we're always thinking about, you know, their business and how do we get very familiar with their business quickly.

3:03Jason Mudd: And if we can't figure out how they make money, then I'm not sure we can be the trusted strategic partner that we need to be. So coming into this conversation, you have in mind three stages of corporate public relations, and that's where I'd like to get started. Well, that was a great opening, Jason, because so many, especially young professionals and some senior, have not yet mastered the answer to any of those three key questions. And their careers are usually short-lived. So that's why this is such an important topic. When I started out after being in journalism and I got into PR, I got hired because I was a good writer or I thought I was and obviously the employer did.

3:44So it was all about, can you write this? and present our case to our various stakeholders. So, you know, I started moving through my career, and I've worked for four different corporations, all in different industries. And when I finally made the big time and I became a corporate, you know, a chief communications officer, I was invited into the Page Society. And during one of the Page Society annual meetings, I was seated next to Harold Burson, who was kind of like the legend of public relations and still is, in my mind, a wonderful man who, unfortunately, we don't have with us anymore. But we became fairly close and he became kind of a mentor.

4:28And so he congratulated me on my new job and he said, so you've advanced to the third stage of your career. And I'm like, what did I not know about? First of all, thank you, but I don't know what the other two stages I must have missed are. And he said, and this stuck with me, he said, stage one as a PR person, which is how I was hired, is management essentially said, okay, help me. How do I say it? How do I say it? In other words, you're now setting your typewriter and you're writing to the best of your knowledge based on all the information you've been fed, information to answer that question.

5:06and then it goes through various iterations of editing. Then the second stage, Harold said, is then you move into that part of your career in your job where you're asked by management, what do I say? Now you're getting really close to where the sweet spot is in a public relations career because that says they're relying on you for how you help them say what needs to be said to those stakeholders. And he said, now you're entering that third stage and you remember this. What do I do? And you had to be prepared for a response on, okay, here is a big opportunity, a crisis or whatever it is, and the management asks you, what do I do?

6:01What do you recommend that we do? you better be able to answer and or put together a response in such a way that fully understands what that business is all about and its key issues and how it makes money and all those other things all go into the mix to help him help management understand and guide them on what they should be doing. So that stuck with me and I share it with classes and others as wise advice. and it came from Harold Burson. I didn't invent it.

6:36Jason Mudd: Yeah, I like that. As I think about through that, I'm trying to put a sign of a term to each one. So maybe the first one is a tactician. The second one might be a strategist and the third might be an advisor or counselor. Would you agree with that? Yeah, it actually becomes, matter of fact, later, as Matt Regas and I describe in two of our books, that stage is that coveted seat at the table. or getting into the room where it happens. Number three in the PR world is when you are told you've arrived. I remember my CEO also helped underscore that one point. He called me in and we're discussing an issue.

7:18And he said, time out. I know all that background and stuff. I want to know what you think we should do. I hired you at this elevated level of being a chief communications officer to understand what we should be doing, not doing a summary of what everyone else would do and the history of the thing. I need to get right to the business objectives we're trying to achieve. And that's why I need a communications person who gives me the honest truth and gives me a point of view on what should we do.

7:58Jason Mudd: Yeah, and I like that term, right? Point of view, I think is really important. So I saw a piece of work being done for one of a CEO of one of our clients organization. And I was asked to take a quick glance at it. And the practitioner had put together a lot of reporting on the topic, like you're describing background. I was like, I'm pretty sure the news outlet doesn't need us reporting the story that they're covering. They need us to give commentary on the story they're covering. And I'm pretty sure they've done a lot more into this. So that was kind of a waste of time for us to look at it like the journalist is asking us to report their news story.

8:35Jason Mudd: They're looking for us to give commentary. And so at the end of the day, that prevented us from getting quoted about something maybe the client didn't even know enough about and staying kind of in our lane. So I see a similarity there. I hate to think that you've got to be in the Page Society, though, in order to be considered to have a seat at the table. No, absolutely not. There are only about 800 members of Page Society. As a matter of fact, at the time Harold and I had that discussion, they were just talking about having reached 200 members. So we were a very small group. By the way, no one ever heard of except page members.

9:11And it's gotten bigger than that now. Colleges know about it and talk about it. But no, this applies to everyone.

9:17Jason Mudd: Yeah, it's been on my aspiration list for decades. So, you know, maybe one day I'll be in that club with you. You should be. Yeah, thank you. I appreciate that. All right. So the second thing we want to cover is what employers want has shifted from writing skills to business acumen. Tell me more about your thinking and perception of that. Yeah, being a writer, and when I first got my first management job at Eli Lilly, I was totally focused on writing. It was like, if you had that skill set, you got an interview. If you worked for a newspaper, you got an interview, and you had good chances of being hired.

9:56Because good writers are good thinkers, always has been the case, and good writers can be trained and they churn out material faster and they're not struggling. But at the same time, they're journalists. They ask good questions. All these things are very important. But because they've been so laser focused as reporters and maybe covering school boards and government meetings and various society meetings in town, their view is so broad with where they're coming from that they haven't had a chance to really dig deep into business issues and what's affecting. unless they're a business reporter, and even some of them haven't, because a lot of business reporters, when I started out, were placed there right out of graduating from school or maybe they had a couple of years experience.

10:54So for our first book that Matt Regas and I did, Business Essentials, about 15 years ago, I guess, we interviewed a large number of chief communications officers, senior leaders of the profession, both senior people like agency heads, as well as chief communications officers. And then he put together a panel of some 40 that he went back and forth with trying to determine what are the things that they really want from people they hire. Within just a couple of years, it went from journalism being number one, business number two, to all of a sudden, a few years later, their first thing they said, I want somebody who understands my business and can communicate my business.

11:50And so we went through, we talked about the fact they really want you to understand their markets, how they make money, They want you to read a balance sheet and help write an annual report. While I was at Lilly, the guy who used to write the annual report quit a few months before it had to be printed. And so my boss says, uh-oh, well, Ron's a journalist. Let him write the annual report. It actually started with an earnings release, which I honestly had to ask the investor relations guy what earnings were. And so I was really one of those naive reporters I was telling you about. journalist. And so he walked me through the process and we wrote a pretty good, with his help, Bob Graper, God love him.

12:37With his help, we wrote a good earnings release. It must have been so good that the CEO asked my boss who wrote that since Russ had left the company. And he said, oh, the new guy did. And he said, well, I think we're going to make him in charge of financial communications. Okay. You didn't love that, huh? Oh, no. But now I tell anyone you're crazy not to take it because it's been the biggest impact on all of my jobs, corporate jobs since. But then I am in charge of the annual report. And there it was definitely a crash course in business. And I wish I knew then what I now tell my students to know before they're faced with a similar situation because I was a deer in headlights.

13:26And it took, you know, like I said, thank God for the IR person who took me under his wing. And I learned a lot. And we produced, while I was there, seven amazing annual reports. And I surrounded myself, by the way, one of the first hires was a good financial writer. And so then, you know, that went on the resume. It became very significant. Every job I had since then in corporate has had financial communications component. And I've had responsibility for annual report at all four of the companies.

13:59Jason Mudd: So around what year did you see where employers started shifting from the emphasis of journalism to business? It really clicked in. We started feeling it about 18 years ago. 15 years ago is where we actually saw the shift when they were surveying that all of a sudden journalism was just a tiny bit, the responses, a tiny bit outpacing business. But business came right up. You know, it became one of the real strong responses. And then at the time we wrote the book, Business Essentials, that was 15 years ago, was the first year that it slightly outpaced journalism. Today, there's no other role or function or background that is strong as business acumen in hiring decisions for communicators, as well as not just communicators anymore.

15:03or it's HR talent. It's, you know, try to get a job in marketing. People say, well, I'm really good at promoting products. And it's not about that. It's about how what you do is going to drive product sales. And importantly, which a lot of young people don't think about, is profits. And then why profits are important or you wouldn't have your job. Right. That's right. Exactly.

15:26Jason Mudd: You're reminding me when I have the opportunity to speak in front of, you know, I get a chance to speak in front of colleagues and business associations. but as a professional speaker, but I really love speaking to students. And when I have the opportunity to do that, the message I hammer home is, you gotta be a great writer, you gotta understand business and you gotta certainly understand strategy. And if you can bring those three things to the table, I'm gonna hire you immediately because the people to your left and people to your right, they don't understand those things. And I say, even if you think you're an excellent writer today, you could be so much better and go find ways and outlets and opportunities, whether it's volunteer or with the campus newspaper or do more writing, learn more about strategy and work through case studies to develop strategy.

16:11Jason Mudd: And then also understand just business and leadership and culture and all those things, including, right, what is a profit and loss statement, what's a balance sheet and all this so that you can speak intelligently to business people because if you just don't get it, they're just not going to trust you as much as they would like. And if they say something simple like P &L and you're like, what's P &L? You know, then it just doesn't sound very good. So the other thing you're reminding me of, we did an episode earlier this year with James Lukaszewski. And I don't know if you know him or not. Absolutely.

16:44Good friend.

16:45Jason Mudd: Yeah. So I'll put a link in the episode notes to the episode we had because I'm seeing some crossover here in what we're talking about, about how to be a trusted advisor. And I think that's a really good episode for people to also tune in in addition to this one. So we talked about what employers want has shifted. And I think that's probably, do you think that's reflective upon the marketplace of there being fewer journalists now available to hire? Or do you think it is more of a focus on the business acumen being desirable for hires? Well, when I started out, journalists outnumbered public relations professionals about 20 to 1.

17:24And today, it's flipped. It's the other way around. Sadly, we need more good journalists. But there's been such a quantum shift. And I love journalists being hired into PR jobs because they're curious. They ask good questions. And I've had many important people, including CEOs that I've worked for, that said, you know why I like you? You're curious about everything. Some CEOs, that would drive crazy, though. Yeah, and I do. I ask so many questions, and they said, and you're genuinely curious. Like, I have technology clients and fertilizer client, someone who makes paper towel and toilet paper.

18:13You know, I'm just fascinated by the whole process of all of that. And too many young people come in with myopic views of what they're going to bring to the table, and they haven't broadened their thinking. Whereas a good journalist, especially one that's had to cover multiple industries, which is what I was doing when I first started out in the media, you had to be, you know, shipped hats all the time. So I do long for more journalists, good journalists, that can serve as part of the pipeline. But sadly, that doesn't exist anymore.

18:46Jason Mudd: Well, 20 to one, 20 journalists to every PR pro would have been, I think, an incredible time to work in the profession because I have not seen those types of numbers. But the newest numbers, instead of 20 journalists to every one PR pro, and I'm sure you know this too, is showing one journalist to every seven public relations professional. But, you know, what I like to tell people is— That's way off, by the way, because so many public relations people have other titles. Well, that's exactly what I was just going to say. I was just going to say that, that, you know, but fortunately PR is a very broad term for what we do.

19:24Jason Mudd: And, you know, so I tell I love telling people that I don't think people listen very often is that media relations for earned media coverage is just one facet of the public relations profession. And, you know, through my APR experience, by the way that we mentioned earlier, earning my accreditation in public relations, I met many practitioners who were employee communications and all of these other professions that I just didn't realize were a real thing, you know, because the organizations I worked at, we'd wing some employee communications when HR leadership was like, hey, can you help us out with this?

20:02Jason Mudd: But it was not our primary job description by any means. And then to meet people who have never pitched a journalist ever in their life and their seasoned PR practitioner was just honestly mind-blowing to me. When I was at Sears, at that time, we had about 60 different agencies when I joined the company working. Every brand had its own agency, and my boss and I were losing our minds over this. And so he said, let's just bring everyone who claims are doing anything in the communications, public relations area. Let's bring them all for a meeting so we get them all on the same page and I can talk to them as a group saying, here's our goals, here's our mission.

20:48So we sent out the broad invitation. And I had at that time about 69 people in the PR team. So when we showed up in the auditorium that morning, I walked in with the CEO and he said, who are all these people? There were over 350 people in the room. They claimed to be part doing PR. Right. That's why I said these numbers are way skewed. Yeah. And so he said, who are all these people? And I said, therein lies our problem. Yeah. Right. Right. And so it's I'll never forget that aha moment. By the way, most of those jobs were folded into our department and or eliminated over the ensuing year. And I got the budgets and and we have a more targeted program that actually resulted in sales increases and some good motion and with within the company and with our stakeholders.

21:49Those are the glory days of Sears when people were actually buying our stock and our products because we were reinventing the place. And it was a real turnaround situation, which was exciting. That does sound exciting.

22:02Jason Mudd: You're reminding me of early in my career at Axia. We had a client and we started getting more and more entrenched in the organization. I felt like every VP in the entire organization had their own personal PR person to make sure their communications looked good and all that stuff. And then soon enough, it started getting to the point where all the directors started getting their own communication person. And it was like, you know, it was like they were building their own personal brand within the enterprise, even though they might have been a VP of IT or something like that. We had similar stories, including one who said, your number one mission is to get me on the cover of every trade publication possible.

22:42Right. Well, that's going to sell. That's going to sell a lot of men's underwear. Right.

22:50Jason Mudd: Exactly. That's funny. That's funny. Well, you know, it's interesting because I do see where, you know, there was some research out of University of Southern California, Annenberg. I don't think they maintain this KPI or this track, this number anymore. But I always found it very interesting. And it basically went something like this. The more W-2 full-time employees employed within a public relations role inside an organization, the more outside agencies that that organization would employ. And, you know, on the surface, you would think it'd be quite the opposite, that if they're managing PR in-house, they don't need to leverage as many outside agencies.

23:34Jason Mudd: But, you know, like anything, as an organism continues to grow, an organism will acquire more and keep growing more. So I always like to kind of keep an eye on that stat, especially given I own a PR agency, right? So it was always curious because it did seem like, in my experience, the smaller the in-house team is, the more they would be resistant to an outside agency saying, if I go to my leadership or my boss and say I need an outside agency, they would wonder what I do here. But I think as the organization gets bigger, it just creates more needs and more productivity and more opportunities.

24:10Jason Mudd: And then suddenly you have people in-house whose full-time job is just managing outside agencies. Been there, done that. Yeah, yeah. Okay, so we talked about what employers want to have shifted. and the key thing is they want writing skills and business acumen with more of a positioning towards the business acumen than per se writing skills. Of course, all of that is very important. But now we want to talk about five practical ways students and young professionals can build their business acumen. And then I'd like for us to bolt on after that, let's talk about what more experienced professionals can do.

24:48Jason Mudd: But let's start with the more entry-level audience. Okay, I'll quickly try to go through five and there may be a bonus one or two. All right, I like bonuses. First of all, everyone, all the young people I say, expand your news diet. And they're like, news? I mean, they get the news that they pick up on Twitter and Facebook and the like, but they're really not spending time, which I tell them, that you should be reading. If you do nothing else, go to page one of the Wall Street Journal every day on the What's News, scan it, circle words you don't understand, and look them up. Because if you want to be taken serious in business, you better understand how business media handles various corporations.

25:39So I say do that. I tell people that they should read at least one influential business book a year. You know, some are like, are you kidding with all the other stuff I have to read? No, it's very important if you do that. And then I said, and I'll even throw in, it can be something like Michael Lewis. You can read him because like a novel and it's all true. That's how exciting his stuff is. So you read and again, circle things you don't understand. But I really think you ought to do that. And then I follow influential business leaders who really have some important thoughts. Some of them I follow very closely, like everything they say and do, like Jamie Dimon.

26:22He's my hero. Has been for a number of years. It used to be Howard Schultz, and then I don't like Starbucks. But it is someone like Jamie Dimon. I immediately get alerts on when he says something. His annual report, his annual letter to shareholders is kind of the new Oracle of Omaha, you know, Warren Buffett type letter. It is so full of important business thought that you really need to read it. But I also follow Taylor Swift. Who would think Taylor Swift is a billionaire? She does comment and she gives her father credit for creating the business interest and business savvy that she has become, in my opinion, an influential business leader.

27:12Oh, for sure. Then to make it really easy, I said, watch movies or TV shows that are both fun and informative like Shark Tank. Love it. Never miss an episode. They're great. Or go back and watch again. Again, if you haven't seen it, absolutely must reading Moneyball and some of the other books, movies that really have done an incredible job of you just listen and you gain knowledge by doing that. Then I pick as my fifth one, pick a public company and follow it. Ideally, one that you really believe in or are passionate about and follow it for a year or two. For the longest time, it was Target. Before that, it was Starbucks.

27:59And, you know, where I have, you know, I'm no longer passionate about those brands. So now I'm back to banking. A lot of people think boring. It's not boring. Financial community is where the most action is happening right now, and you have to be there. So pick a company, follow it. And you'll find if you're reading their annual report, the letter to the shareholders, and listen to the annual earnings call. You just tune in. And these guys are pretty candid and open about what's happening in their business. And they say things that then look it up, you know, write it down. So, you know, pick that company.

28:41And then my bonus ones, I guess, would you got to build a network inside the company. your organization. Everyone thinks networking means outside. That's very important career-wise. But inside the company, I made sure that I created a network with legal accounting, especially important, the chief financial officer. Take them to coffee. Buy coffee or bring it to their office because they're busy and just have a chat. Hey, I'm fairly new with the company or agency. You know, what do you do? I had a couple of interns do that when I was in the agency world, and I will never forget it. They knew what kind of coffee I liked.

29:24I brought exactly that. And so it was a good session. And then finally, one of my students, former students, Emma Gresser, Emma created her own board of directors, and she pulled together people who she relied upon. And then sometimes you have terms expire and maybe I'm no longer on her board, but she's replaced me with somebody else. And she occasionally checks in with them and they give great advice about what's going on my business that's going to help you. She's had a meteoric career as a young person in this profession. And it's because she is so well networked. She knows what's happening in the business world.

30:10So these are, I guess, my five plus things that immediately come to mind.

30:15Jason Mudd: Well, those are really cool. I like those a lot. I wrote down several of them. You're reminding me that I love the idea of having, you know, making sure my team is listening to our clients' quarterly earnings call on a regular basis because our PR messages have to align with what the Wall Street messages are, the IR messages. And so if we can pull direct quotes from those earnings calls and use them for later or help feed other content we're working on. Obviously, that's critically important. And then you're also reminding me about a young woman who was doing the same thing, building a great network as a college student.

30:49Jason Mudd: I wish I would have known to do this. I wish I would have done this. But she looked at the city she wanted to be living in and she contacted the 20 largest employers in that city. And she asked for a mentor at all 20 companies. And so when she's starting to graduate, right, she's got an army of advocates looking out for her at companies who are more likely to hire. And so one day the CFO of our biggest client calls me and says, Jason, I want you to take this young woman to lunch. She's interested in PR and, you know, send me the bill for it. So of course I did everything he asked for, except for send him the bill for it because I covered that on my own.

31:28Jason Mudd: But, you know, and so I met with this woman, young woman, she's very impressive. And I told her I've never heard of anybody doing something like this, but golly, that was really impressive and something I wish I would have done, which sounds like basically what you're saying that this student was doing by creating their own board of directors. Big idea. I love what she did and the fact that she was able to pull it off because sometimes it's a very delicate approach to make that sort of thing happen because everyone's so stressed for time, but I love her. That's very important. Yeah, I totally agree.

32:03Jason Mudd: So I'm just curious, you've gotten bored or disenfranchised with Target and Starbucks? Well, Starbucks, I thought the quality has failed. And I used to own a coffee store back when I lived in Albany, worked for the government. And I opened a coffee store because I was bored. And I did that on the side. And it's celebrating its 50th anniversary this year. So we're going to go back for a celebration. Oh, cool. And so I became a coffee snob a long time ago. And I thought that the product quality is not what I would expect. I didn't like the flavors. It's darker roast coffee. Sometimes I feel it tastes burned.

32:43So I'm very snobbish about what kind of roasting I want. And there's a, I've constantly, people follow me on Instagram will see that I'm constantly reviewing coffee roasters that I discover. And I will drive way out of my way. I'm going up to one in northern Wisconsin on Monday because they have a special roasting technique. And so I have a lot of, and then I generally just highlight them and say, I'm in search of the perfect cup of coffee. I'm close to having found it in Panama, but I look everywhere for it, little mom and pop shops and all over because it's been fun, and they're all better than Starbucks.

33:28Yeah, right. And then I think Target, just like a lot of people, including customers, I used to be there probably two or three times a week, and I haven't been there maybe twice in the past six months because, you know, they've been going through a lot of pain and trying to reorganize. They have a new CEO who, by the way, is doing a really good job and he's got a talented PR team. So I hope that that company does what they're promising to do because it is and was a great company and a wonderful competitor to anyone in retail. And I want to get back to that place. But so I got, you know, you kind of get bored a little bit, but then if you're a little disappointed in the product, If you haven't bought anything recently, then shift to something that you're really excited about.

34:15And that's why I'm back to doing a case. Gotcha.

34:18Jason Mudd: Gotcha. You know, when you speak about Target, it reminds me sometime around 03 to 07, and probably I could tighten it up to be more like 05 to 06 if I had to. But I remember, you know, Walmart saying that they were basically trying to be more like Target and Target saying they were trying to be more like Walmart. And at the end of the day, it's capitalism. They were both, I think, being a little greedy and wanting market share from each other. But people don't go to Walmart because they want it to be more like Target and people don't go to Target because they want it to be more like Walmart. And I think that really hurt both brands as they were diluting their value or positioning statement or marketplace position.

34:54Jason Mudd: And then the Great Recession hit, which made them, you know, in almost every company that was trying something new or different, went back to what they do best and stopped kind of at least these more expansive, creative experiments and went back to, OK, how do we experiment with getting more revenue quickly? So anyway, I just to me, that was kind of the I think the beginning of the change that you're describing with targets. Yep, absolutely. Spot on. Okay, well, the other thing we want to talk about is these were great five practical ways students and young professionals can build their business acumen.

35:26Jason Mudd: I took a few notes here myself of interesting things to share with others or maybe even explore myself. Is there anything you would prescribe to senior professionals that might be different than these for more junior professionals? Well, some of the same things, many of the same things still apply. But the one thing, senior people, when they get jobs, these jobs, as you move up the ladder in corporate or agency positions, are very demanding. And everyone thinks, I don't have time to do anything outside of my job. So they ignore network building. They don't go to events. They don't know anyone.

36:01And guess what happens? They eventually get fired, maybe, unfortunately. And then what do I do? They also ignored their LinkedIn profile and they've added no one. It's outdated very often. So I said, okay, you've got to continue networking and you have to build a robust LinkedIn page. It is your brand today. Matter of fact, as a demonstration of my classes, I take a stack of resumes and I rip them up and throw them in the air. And I said, throw them away. They are no value. If you're going to get hired, it's through your network and or you're going to be found on LinkedIn. Every recruiter now has gotten rid of all their files and don't send them a resume.

36:43They'll throw it away. They're going to find you and they find you through their various high paid services that are run by the back room for them today is not their own computers. It's LinkedIn. So they match up and they know more about you. And they but if you don't have it on your LinkedIn profile, they'll never find you. And so many people will call me and say, I haven't talked to you in about 20 years. I know where this is going, right? Yeah, exactly. Well, I'm sorry I lost track. Okay. And you're kind of leery. Like it's always when something somebody wants and it's so much easier just to say, drop them a note through LinkedIn.

37:25Jason Mudd: Yeah. Say, just saw this article. I thought you were interested. You know, I thought of you. Haven't talked to you in a while. Do not tie any strings to it. No ask. Right. Right. And so I think those are the two things that really bother me that are so easy to do. And it may take five extra minutes a day. You've got to build your personal brand. And then so many also do nothing in social media. They're not listening to podcasts. They're not on any of the three major social media channels, even though I don't think Twitter is as important as it used to be. But business still uses it. But you've got to find something where you create your own to show that you're adept in what's going on social media-wise.

38:08And then, of course, AI is something that we're all tackling and is so terribly exciting. I can't stand it. So, but a lot of senior professionals are saying, I'm going to hire somebody to do that for me. And so, no, you've got to figure out Claude all on your own and have fun doing it. And it may take an hour out of your day, but you're going to be rewarded later, especially if, God forbid, you have to look for a job. And they're going to ask you if you're familiar with AI. And you better be.

38:38Jason Mudd: Right. Yeah, I see that. We've done another episode, which I'll link in the episode notes to with AARP, right, about ageism in the workplace and, you know, that kind of thing. And I know that happens. I also, though, I think sometimes that will happen in the event that the individual doesn't know how to properly express their ability to use technology and their willingness to use technology and their eagerness to learn and things like that. And some people I think are just naturally curious, like you and I seem to be. And I'm always wanting to learn the newest thing. And, you know, other people are just, oh, I'm not interested in that.

39:11Jason Mudd: And when AI first came out, people were just like, oh, I'm against it. And I think it's unethical and I'm just not going to learn it. I'm like, well, good thing you own your own business or whatever it might be, right? Because the market's moving there with or without you. But I just want to add, if somebody's listening, I'm spot on. I'm with you on LinkedIn. Like for 20 years, I've told people, don't send me your resumes. I send me a link to your updated LinkedIn because what does that show me? It shows me one, who you're connected to, right? How well connected are you? It shows me some of your writing samples, right?

39:42Jason Mudd: Because you're posting your own content and you're posting your own profile. And every day I get a profile or see a profile, it's got typos in it, you know? And then the other thing is it's in a consistent format that I can go look for what I want to see and not try to find it on a resume. And again, like you said, it's not a bunch of papers on my desk and things like that. So we have an ATS applicant tracking system where people apply online for positions with our company and or we use LinkedIn. And on that applicant tracking, we say, hey, either upload your resume or give us your LinkedIn link.

40:13Jason Mudd: What I also like about LinkedIn is that I perceive they're less likely to lie or exaggerate about their experience on LinkedIn because it's out there for everybody to see. Now, I know for a fact that's not always true, but, you know, you would hope there'd be a little more accountability or reluctancy to put inaccurate or exaggerating information on their LinkedIn. There better be. Yeah, yeah. I need to go right back to what you opened with there. I was an early resistor of the internet, and they tried to assign the intranet to me at my last corporation. and I said, oh, one more thing I have to manage, another fad.

40:58And so I come back and I tell my two direct reports who were doing internal and external communications, I said, guess what they asked me to do? I think this belongs someplace else. And they said, are you kidding me? You go back and say, yes, this is the future. And so when AI came around, I'm like, are you kidding me? You know, is it a fad? No, this is the real thing. And we should be excited and terrified. So I want to be excited and figure out ways to make it more exciting.

41:31Jason Mudd: Well, you and I have been doing this long enough. And I point to, you know, when the internet first came out and people were reluctant to get online and put their business online and all that. And I think they either had to change their mind or close their doors unless they're just a mom and pop dry cleaner or something like that, you know? And that's what I've been telling companies for the last several years is like, you need to get on this and ahead of this before you find yourself playing catch up and it's too late. So before we move on to the final topic, was there anything else you wanted to mention to help senior practitioners build their business acumen?

42:06They, again, all the other things that applied to the younger people really apply. They're not reading. Most senior people, again, don't think they have time to read the Wall Street Journal. Even as I approach this stage in my life, I still make a point. I don't read it as thoroughly, but I make sure I know because I've been yelled at twice by a CEO. Both times is because something appeared in the journal about our company that I didn't know about. Okay. And I walk into the office at 730 in the morning and he said, why in the hell didn't I know about this? Right. And I didn't know about it because my team member didn't tell me that he got a call from the Wall Street Journal the day before.

42:47So anyway, not knowing about it, if I just picked up the paper and looked through the index, I would have known I better know something about this. I also hesitate saying, you have a limo taking you to work. I have to drive. Guess what I did? I got up 20 minutes earlier every day in order to pull the journal off my doorstep and read it, scan it before I got in my car to drive 40 miles to work. Right. Right. Right. Okay. All right.

43:17Jason Mudd: Well, you're reminding me of when I used to drive nearly that many miles, 35 each way, and I don't miss that at all. No. But yes, so I would use a lot of that time. The part I do miss is my ability to listen to podcasts and audiobooks and things like that that you're describing as well as kind of ways to build our business acumen. And so in closing, I think we've covered this pretty well, but I'll give you a chance to kind of wrap a bow on what we've talked about today by why does business acumen matter? It is, first of all, I think the more you get involved in it, it really is exciting. I became far more interested in my job and career when I understood what I was working on and how it mattered.

44:06And I was able to make, especially when I became a manager, I was able to make strategic decisions as to where we put our resources. And all of a sudden, somebody's running off saying, this event, this, you know, some form of a promotion for a product is, you know, like the second coming great idea. And then I started asking questions like, is it really? Like, we're going to sponsor a bass fishing tournament in Nashville to promote marine batteries. Okay. So I called the CFO's office and I said, could you tell me how much money we make on marine batteries? And he said, oh, my God. First of all, we don't sell them in marinas.

44:52We only sell them through the stores. So you have to come to an auto store to buy them. And this, that, this, and that. So I said, well, just tell me how much we make. Well, the event being sponsored for the third year, which ended the next year, was more than we made profit-wise on those batteries. So those decisions, I did make a friend out of that brand manager, who I hope isn't listening to this. but he knows it you just make better decisions if you have a sense of what the business is all about and when what you're doing isn't having any impact on the business you really have to question it if you don't you're going to start being questioned that's exactly right yeah that's good advice as

45:42Jason Mudd: well well ron this is a pleasure it's nice to meet you after all these years and i'm going to put a link to your LinkedIn profile in our episode notes, which by the way, for our audience, if you heard something you liked in this episode, we're going to provide links for you to help kind of guide along this conversation. It'll be on our at on top of PR slash Ron dash Culp C-U-L-P. And on that, we'll put a link to Ron's LinkedIn profile so you can get connected with him there. When you do send him a LinkedIn connection invite, please customize it. Let him know that you saw him on on top of PR. Because my experience is people are more likely to connect with you if you tell them how and why you want to get connected.

46:24And be sure to follow my career blog too, which is at Culprit, C-U-L-P-U-R-I-T. I try to update it every week with a new post, and I have a lot of senior people in the profession contributing to it. Oh, great. And I hope you do at some point, Jason. It's very helpful, has a huge readership of mostly young people beginning their careers in PR or students. I love that.

46:50Jason Mudd: Excellent. Thank you. We'll put a link to that also from those episode notes again, on top of PR slash Ron-Culp. And if you ever need anything else, Ron, just let me know. I'd be happy to help you in any way that I can. But with that, this has been a great episode. thank you for joining us. And for our audience today, thank you for tuning in. If you found this episode helpful, tell a friend or colleague about it. And if you haven't already, please leave us a review on the podcast platform of your choice. In exchange, email us. We will put your name into a drawing, send you some on top of PR swag, thanking you for taking the time to leave us a review.

47:28Jason Mudd: Well, you're going to get some already just for being a guest. So, but we would appreciate your review as well, as long as you disclose that you were a guest on the show, I think that would be great. And if you're looking for where to leave that review, certainly you can go to ontopoppr.com slash review, or you can check out the episode notes where there'll be a link there to do that. But the best way to do that would be honestly just to go directly to ratethispodcast.com slash ontopoppr. And again, you can catch episodes of Ontop PR on any platform that you listen to or consume other podcasts, including YouTube, which is actually our most popular platform for people checking out On Top of PR.

48:06Jason Mudd: I hope something great happens to you today. This has been On Top of PR with Jason Mudd, presented by ReviewMaxer. Be sure to subscribe so you don't miss an episode and check out past shows at ontopofpr.com.

48:36Thank you.