It’s always good to get out of the New York bubble and see how the PR industry works in the other important markets throughout the U.S.
And Chicago, where I was this week, is one of the best places to get an alternative perspective.
Visiting PR agencies such as Golin and Weber Shandwick (many other excellent firms are also available, of course, these just happened to be the two I visited) and the in-house comms function at ConAgra, all in Chicago’s famous Merchandise Mart, provided an extremely illuminating glimpse into how modern PR is practised.
Weber and Golin have a central lobby area where you turn left for the Susan Howe-helmed Interpublic Group firm and go straight on to visit the Al Golin-founded agency.
The two firms have been in situ in the Mart for just over a year and walking into the space is quite the Zen-like experience.
There isn’t a piece of clutter in view in the hotdesk environment… no papers, books and magazines.
On my short visit there I saw PR pros sitting quietly engrossed in their work, with rooms of various sizes available for client meetings, brainstorms, content creation, and other modern PR tasks. I’m sure clients enjoy coming there.
At Golin, they were setting up chairs for a day-long training in a central area that resembled a TV newsroom with a bank of screens where people can be patched in from around the U.S. and the world. Town hall meetings are also conducted there.
It was good to see various tips of the hat to the agency’s iconic founder Al Golin, from entering the office to a special room set up with mementos including a telegram from McDonald’s founder Ray Kroc, which said: “We would never have made it without your help. We were immature amateurs with virtually no friends. Thank you, Al, a million times.”
There were many other mementos, including a picture of Ernest Hemingway – with Al – and, gratifyingly, Al’s PRWeek Hall of Fame trophy from his induction into the first tranche of honorees in 2013.
That is the vibe the new PR agency is searching for. And there is a similar, but different, ethos in the air at the neighboring Weber Shandwick office, reflective of the sibling IPG agency’s own distinctive culture.
Like I said, this was one snapshot from a short visit to an iconic PR market, and many other firms are available. (Send us a picture of your office that sums up the new working environment.)
But all PR firms and in-house teams are striving for a place that is attractive to come to as part of a hybrid working week, technologically forward-looking to fuel the impact of the AI revolution, and redolent of the special sauce that defines each individual group.
As Robert Pirsig notes in his book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: “A person who sees Quality and feels it as (s)he works is a person who cares. A person who cares about what (s)he sees and does is a person who’s bound to have some characteristics of Quality.”
That’s a mantra that is as true today as it was when the book came out over 50 years ago in 1974.
