I have been asked many times why I entered the PR profession after having spent so many years in Engineering.  I was asked again this week when I was lecturing at Bournemouth University to a group of MA students.  My rather Flippant answer was “mid life crisis, bought a motorbike and changed career”.

Me at aged 16

I thought about this later and started thinking about my career to date.  At 16, after taking my exams, I was all set to go on to sixth form college and then on to Uni.  Despite getting good exams results I decided that I wanted to leave full time education and earn money.  I opted for an engineering apprenticeship and eventually progressed to being a “fitter turner”.  A 5 year, part-time college course also gave me the mechanical Engineering theory to support my practical experience.

It was at the age of 21 that I moved into an office based Engineering role.  The next ten years saw me change roles every two years, gaining experience and responsibility as I went.  I moved through product engineering, quality engineering, service centre management, project management and then into sales. After some time in sales I moved into a customer support role, acting as a consultant to some of the major processing plants in the south of the UK. These included Exxon, BP, Dow, Elf, Mobil, National Power to name but a few.  I also gained an MBA along the way.

This takes me up to my mid-life-crisis. I knew that I wanted to do something different but wasn’t sure what.  My sales role had moved me away from the main hub’s of the business, moving wasn’t an option so continuing my career with my existing employer was out of the question.  I managed to negotiate a leaving package without having anything else lined up to go to. It was at this point that I was approached by the marketing communications agency I work for now.  Following a couple of  interviews I found myself working in PR without really understanding what it was all about.

The transition was easy because our agencies main client is my ex employer. It was easy to write about products and technologies that I knew intimately.  A CIPR diploma in Public Relations added to my knowledge and enabled me to understand more about the public relations role other than just writing press releases.

Now I get to the point of this long ramble.  I did stumble in to PR – the same as I stumbled into every position I held.  I didn’t have a career plan in mind when I left school, however if somebody had written out a plan for me all those years ago that followed the route I had taken it would have all made sense. I can see that each role I have had has built on the one I held previously and made me the person I am today.

I believe I am fairly unique in our industry, I can go talk to the engineers and understand what they are talking about, I can go talk to management and understand what their goals are, how they link to the overall business goals and what affect they have on the bottom line.  I can then take that information and structure a press release or an article that is relevant to the readership.  I can put together a campaign plan that truly addresses the needs of the business.  I am comfortable and confident in what I do with our technology clients.

Other PR professionals may choose a different route to get to the end destination. Coming back to the PR students I was talking to this week, they are choosing to start their career in public relations, and who would blame them I think it is an excellent career choice.  What they will have to remember though is that in order to be comfortable and confident with their clients they will need to invest considerable amounts of time and energy in understanding their clients businesses. After all, I spent 30 years understanding mine.

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