I would like to share my experience of having internship in one of global pulp and paper company, APRIL Group. Here, I was working in Corporate Communications Department of Jakarta branch office for 4 months. The team consists of 5 people which were 2 Corporate Communications officers, Corporate Communications Manager, Corporate Affairs Director and me as the intern.
During the time, of course, I learned many knowledge which I did not obtain in college classes. One of the valuable ones is differences between Corporate Communications and Public Relations.
Let me share my short journey before I decided to have internship in APRIL Group. President University where I am studying Communication Studies, oblige all students to take internship opportunity from a company which is related to our field of study. Hence, I started to look for communications-related internship vacancy in my last two semesters. Among all my application, I got good response from The Ritz Carlton Jakarta, The Body Shop Indonesia, and APRIL Group. I had to refuse offer from The Ritz Carlton Indonesia because they offered me to work in Sales and Marketing Department instead of Public Relations Department. There were two options left then: The Body Shop Indonesia or APRIL Group. In The Body Shop, I would be placed in Public Relations Department, while in APRIL Group, I would be placed in Corporate Communications Department. At that time, I got confused what are the differences of those two departments? Or are they similar with different term? Asking friends and browsing information through Internet. Still, I did not get clear explanation. I did not care anymore, my mind just said “both of those department are actually communications-related jobs. So why do you have to worry?” Eventually, I decided to take the opportunity offered by APRIL Group because of technical matters.
Ok, back to the question. What are the differences between Corporate Communications and Public Relations?
If you put the question on Google search, you can find many articles answering it. However, the explanation may give you confusion and dilemma – some state that both are similar with just different term, some state that one is better than the other. My article may be one of them, but I write this based on my experience that hopefully can help you to have better consideration and judgment.
During my internship, I observed jobs of my superiors in APRIL Group. Corporate Communications Department tends to do or handle strategic work and management which are:
Communication Management (internal and external communications flow) – Crisis Communication – Issue Management – Public Affairs – Reputation Management – Branding – Events and Sponsorship – Shareholders and Stakeholders Relations – Media Relations
They hire a communications firm which help the company as communication technician such as writing and distributing press release, ensuring APRIL Group has good media coverage, doing media monitoring, and giving advice for any communication strategy planned by the Corporate Communications Department.
Public Relations Department, however, tends to do all PR activities independently. Lately, I remembered what The Body Shop’s PR manager told me when I did my internship interview, “The Body Shop use ‘PR Department’ term, and we do all the job descriptions without hiring a communications agency or consultant”. Besides, my friend who had internship in PR Department of The Ritz Carlton Jakarta was doing the same. She said that they do not hire any communications firm, hence, the PR Department is served as
Communications Technician – Communications Manager – Communications Strategist
So, which one is better?
Unfortunately, I cannot say that Corporate Communications Department is better than Public Relations Department and vice versa. It depends on you – your willingness and expertise in doing the job descriptions above. My suggestion is you should first work in PR Department in certain company or communications firm so you can learn all overall PR activities and roles as technician, manager, and strategist. When you switch to Corporate Communications Department, you can do the works easier because you have already had experiences and knowledge in it.
Hope you are doing well, people!