 Welcome to our next series of webinars and today we're focusing on the PR and platform industry. As we know all the sectors are going through tough times because of COVID and this industry too is going through its own set of challenges. The topic for today is how our PR agency is bracing for a post COVID business environment and with me quickly I'll introduce more on the panel as we've already seen but for those who have logged in, we have a little ministry, President PRCAI and Group CEO of Airbnb. We have Mr. Kunal Kishore founder value 360. We have Mr. Udin Patak, Director Media Mantra. We have Ms. Taranjit Ratan, founder of NUPSPR. We have Mr. Gini Thanda, founder and CEO of Kaizu. We have Gubi Sinha who will be joining us, MD of Commune Brand Communications. We have Mr. Aman Bhukla, MD, SPHE of Asia and my co-moderator will be Karan who will be asking questions and as I said we'll be taking audience questions as well. So I can start with Mr. Mantri. Mr. Mantri, I can't see him here right now. My first question to you is that PR and Gopcom sector is going through a lot of challenges and as an association at the level of association, how are you looking at dining over this time collectively in terms of giving motivation to people who are associated with this domain and in terms of ensuring that we're all prepared to collectively tie through it and safely land on the other side? Yeah, good question. I think, yeah, as an association we're doing multiple things. I think there are three levels really. One is talking to government and other stakeholders, regulators, etc. where we are offering our help to help them. We've sent a letter to the ministry of health. We are actually in talks with myGov to do some work around the Aragya Situ app. So we are doing that at one level. For our staff, for our members, we're looking at, we've done a lot of mental health campaigns. We've done campaigns around social distancing, etc. We are also looking at impact study to talk about what the impact on the industry will be. There are various things that the association is doing and of course we talk to each other every week. We talk to each other every week to share ideas and stuff and those ideas actually help people also develop their own strategy to go ahead. There's no doubt it's a tough time. It's going to be a challenging year and I guess every organization will get its own collective decision on what they will do on to tide over this crisis. But I think there's, I just want to say it's going to be a tough year to be prepared for anything and everything. But the silver lining really is that I believe the industries will find a way to overcome these hurdles and become stronger and relevant more over time. As before this conversation started, we were chatting on how comms have become a business critical need with clients approaching firms to work on the crisis and cup comms and employ engagement. In fact, a recent survey by provokes said that 82% of the agency's service and brands are reaching out to them for crisis council and contingency plans for the campaigns. While over half the in-house professional service said that they will not cut budget, but that's just half. So there's still half who might cut. So in this unprecedented world of COVID-19, we should therefore focus really on providing excellent uninterrupted service for our clients. I think at the core, our role will be to guide brands in how they can help communicate in a crisis and sorry, help communities in a crisis. So I think purpose driven comms will become very important. Thanks. I'll stop here. Kunal, I want to come to you and ask you the same question. In this tough time wherein we are seeing a lot of stress on companies, how are you keeping the employees motivated? That's a very critical part of actually testing us on multiple levels as business leaders. How are you ensuring to keep them motivated and help them tide over? Actually, none of us were ever prepared for something that is happening to us today. But as quickly as anybody could possibly adapt, our industry also adapted and same is our organization where we actually ensure that the continuity of work and seamless service offering should be key to our service delivery right now. While doing that, we also have an understanding and we do empathize that in this scenario, the inner situation where we are all living in isolation, we are living where we are not part of our work is beyond our home. We also understand that there are few people who are actually living all alone where they have to manage their homework and also work from home and manage that there is business continuity in terms of seamless delivery. We are empathetic to that and we are largely, we are from time to time, we are actually trying to do things like we've actually we've done a session with the psychologist to largely talk and have an interactive session where people can address the issue, which was there were issues related to kids at home, there were issues related to working in isolation, all those were part of it which happened yesterday. Then we actually tried doing getting every team together in terms of some fun sessions where we did Zumba sessions, we did sessions where we did stand up act from within the team. So we are actually trying to engage people, we're trying to get them to feel that we are all part of one unit. While we know that situation is grim, we are trying to keep our hopes high. Like Mithin said that PR becomes a critical part of all the enterprise today because this is the only function that they can't, they can't avoid for even giving example of even the airline companies that we are representing, which are right now has suffered massively. They're also looking at PR as a very important tool to communicate with the stakeholders. So I feel PR as a whole, I think while there is, there would be an impact, but I strongly feel that there is what we are seeing today is that PR will even become strongly out of it once things start becoming normal. So yeah. Was it the same question to you? I mean, how are you ensuring this electric motivation? So I think if you actually look at if PR is needed, this is the time when PR is needed the most right now. Because if we actually look at, we should be implicated towards the clients because if you actually look at they require, they require communication is very important because they can't allow messaging to stop at all. And today, but sometime it is not just about communication. It is also about talking with the client on a regular basis. For example, today, in the past one week, I was around 10 to 12 calls where clients are just calling me and talking about their business as a whole as an industry as a whole. So it is important for everyone to understand that and talk to the client. So this is what I keep telling my team as well. We should not leave this. We should just keep talking to the client understand what problem they are in because to be very honest, we are still in far, far better positions than what clients are today. They have got bigger problems to solve. Their entire supply chain is disturbed currently. So we need to talk to the client, make sure that there is some kind of messaging which is going out for sure. Personally speaking, I've spoken with a lot of them and if required, we have taken some steps wherein we have reduced retainers, wherein we have asked them for deferred payments as well. So it is very, very important for every firm, if we have to become from agency to a consultancy, this is the time to do it. This is the right time to talk as a consultant and not talk as an agency for sure. Beneath the unique challenges, nobody was prepared for this and unforeseen situation, difficult time. What is your strategy? I mean, how as a set up is the set up to find new ones. You are a mute. Sorry. So, thanks Rohil. So, like Nathan spoke and I spoke, you know, a couple of things which I really feel at this stage I would want to highlight, one, to start with, no problem is infinite. So that is the premise with VS Kaizen and as an industry, we are starting. I must say the PRCAI right now, and I'm just talking largely on an industry level, the kind of work which is happening at PRCAI is commendable. I never thought, I'm sure no other industry body would be so active the way we are. And thanks to Nathan, Anoop, everybody Jyoti, everybody. I think this is a great time and we are learning from each other. There's a lot of experience sharing, there's a lot of discussion on each and every topic, whether it's government, whether it's the employees or whether it's clients. And I believe there's a lot of synergies around which we are picking it up and I'm really happy about that. Now, coming back to Kaizen as a specific case study, we are a mid-sized company. What we have done internally to face this problem is, I believe if, for example, if we were, or I was talking to the team members, say once or twice in a month, right now I'm talking to them every week. The mandate is very clear, even from the second line to third line, that they need to connect with everybody in their teams, respective teams, and enter a team almost every day. So there is this very strong connect amongst people. Now, these are tough times. People are working in isolation, people are, you know, have their own issues at home, which probably we are not aware of. So it's not that, you know, comfortable time from the people's point of view. And I think what we have done internally is one, we have given a mandate that there won't be, of course, there are rationalizing of salaries depending on the businesses and depending on, you know, it's sort of a larger restructuring which we have done. And that too is very transparent. And I believe, you know, it is very important that at this stage what we have done is our external communication, which is to the world, to the clients versus internal communication, they are all same. So there is no difference between, you know, that communication strategy, what we are talking to the clients, we are talking to the team in the same manner and same. So I think that's another thing which has helped us, transparency has helped us. The third thing what we've done is, you know, engaging and there are some, you know, each organization would have some people who are always at a receiving end, you know, that bottom of the pyramid, even in this restructuring side, there are certain issues which have come up and we have committed them from our side, from a personal side, that any need which come across or arise for them, we'll be happy to support them. So I think there are a lot of these personal things which we are doing to make sure that things, and I personally believe we can sail through this problem only and only if our teams are with us. We will rise stronger and better if this team is with us and I think there is nobody who would not agree with me on that point and I think that's where the first priority comes in. And then we move to the client. We have adjusted a lot of business models according to the client's need, we understand their revenues have hit badly. So there are all kind of models which we have worked around with clients. The other thing which we have done is there are clients who have gone for, you know, for say two months, three months, retain a recess. We are trying to give a basic minimal services to them as well. So we are not discontinuing, engaging with them, we are not discontinuing probably as smaller services which we all do, they're sending them the daily, you know, the news tracking. So there are a lot of these smaller things which we are doing and I'm getting into very technical stuff which at times really help, you know, organizations and their companies or the clients to at least understand the value of this. The final point which I probably want to talk about is I think the PR will never go out of picture. PR was needed BC which is before COVID is required even now probably more and it would be required post COVID as well and that probably will get stronger. Thank you. Okay. So I think most of my colleagues have already talked about it. The way we look at it is that a pandemic like COVID-19 like any other humanitarian crisis brings in a huge change and a huge level of uncertainty and I think that's true for every industry, every individual in every organization which is out there. What will emerge after the COVID-19 as a society and as a business ecosystem will be very different from where we are. So I think what is happening right now is at three levels. At an industry level I think this is the time which PRCI as an industry body got everybody together and I think that's something which is helping each of us to work together, share experiences, share ideas and to ensure that industry per se remains together, collaborates to really move to the next level and then there are companies who are trying to find their own platforms or they're trying to found their own strategies how they want to really move things forward but the basic idea is that there has to be a business continuity and if you look at from a business continuity you will have your strategies around your client engagement, you will have your strategies around how do you want to keep your employees inspired and engaged and you're also looking at what the future may look like and you're doing a scenario mapping and based on the scenario mapping what kind of business strategies could you evolve. I think this is also the time to look at what kind of innovations could come in what the future may look like and I'm sure most of my peers would be really looking at what that future is quite uncertain but I think we are all prepared to look at. So yes it is a time challenging but again and we will do whatever is required to overcome the challenges and ensure that the business remains ongoing and be as an industry communication remains integral to the to the business and I think everybody has said clients have come back to us so while they might be a short term change in their way of looking at the world but you know once we are you know over this little you know hill or little hurdle communication is going to be one of the core aspects they will be focusing on. Before I come to Taranjit I would just want to share the repeating light their light meets on hashtag E4M webinar so I request everyone watching this to keep tweaking this. Taranjit your thoughts on this how are you keeping your staff motivated in this business. Okay so we have never been busier because any industry was ever prepared to survive a crisis it was PR. We have always been you know preparing crisis documentation, tapping our clients up for crises. I think we were almost halfway there when this crisis hit and we thought working from home if everybody thought working from home was going to be a part holiday then the PR guys have a different yeah we've never been busier they've been up from nine to nine um and brought them throughout so I have also put a lot of stress on the team. It also means you know our entire scope of work has actually expanded justity from not just doing regular PR activities but also internal communication social listening, your sensitization, all of that so it means that every member of the team is getting involved with what is happening on a day-to-day basis with a particular client. As far as motivation is concerned yeah we have you know we've done a lot of interesting WhatsApp sessions, Facebook lives to make sure that everybody is connected but one of the key things that we try and do is every week we make it a point to have a video call with everyone so that everyone just gets around together you know this is like the office yeah so we all get out get on a video call together whether it's a Zoom call or a Google call and make sure that we see each other and talk to each other about the issues and challenges that we are facing. One the first week and the second week was okay third by the third week you really start seeing the stress come out so apart from me personally being involved with every team member and speaking to them and making sure that they are fine especially the ones that are staying alone away from home it's essential that all of us get together as a group and talk to each other see each other and have a little bit of a laugh to make sure that everybody is you know happy and around. Ruby joined us lately but I just want to rephrase the question that we're talking about how are we keeping the workforce motivated during this crisis and we're just understanding and listening to individual approaches so just how are you ensuring making sure that your work is motivated during this crisis? You know Rohil this is a crisis situation but most of our clients are very active right now so the way we are trying to ensure that most of our people they at least stay connected with each other right from top down everybody's the team every day have proper ongoing team falls probably on a daily basis see if someone has a problem need from bandwidth issues so any other personal issues we are trying to solve it we start something called a Friday session where you make the team to come together and just discuss anything that works as a team go share some videos as well they're working from home etc just ensure that there's somebody for everyone when they have their moments when they need to speak to someone somebody in the team right right right perfect um then I want to come to you uh and after this round Taren would be asking the questions I also want to just remind that we take hashtag before and after now uh tell me Nitin do you think you know we are a company we are agencies we have a bigger role to play in the post-covid world because you know everybody would try to reposition as we know the business are going through tough times and they have to reach the entire landscape we get rigid you think we are agencies that teams would have a lot of work on their hands it's not as um do me as it seems to be like audio is here I totally believe so um I think post-covid uh agencies will have will come back stronger um see what's gonna happen is from from a couple of perspectives some clients um we'll have to look at client engagement for a difference perspective the rules the engagement rules might change but the need will probably go up um and I do urge a lot of people to read Paul Holmes article on post-covid where he talks about how 34 area on 34 areas where uh PR firms will really uh uh march ahead the thing is that we'll have to definitely go a little beyond the scope of work as we start going to post-covid ensure that you know all our offerings kind of adapt to this change um they'll be they will be uh uh people will realign the strategies as in our clients and therefore we have to adapt their to their challenges you know what they were saying earlier that they're all going their whole supply chain is disrupted they're all going to look at their business continuity plans also which will completely change so that'll all change um but so all clients will recognize the need PR agencies to quickly respond to situations so that continue um we will help in building rebuilding brands we'll help in building market competitiveness market competitiveness reputation uh policy advocacy will increase uh I think fake news is a big big aspect and I think while we're seeing a big lot of challenges in the media today I think I actually think the media will gain traditional media will gain more credibility the format might change and become more digital but they'll get more credibility because the fake news are fading today and I think PR firms can play a large large role over there in preventing fake news digital services will of course go up um this whole crisis will be like an asset test for brands and people will really remember how you behave during the crisis so it's a chance for a lot of companies to show empathy and humanity you know like like what mcdonald's is doing or what some other company is doing i don't want to name all the companies but yeah and therefore brands need to enlist firms to help to live up to their purpose you know um it's it's a huge opportunity on how we're going to build brands in the future to be honest uh I just feel the opportunity lies with us and it's up to us to really grab the opportunity with a lot of plans do you share the sentiments do you agree that it's a lot of positivity on the other side this time for the PR agencies there is a lot of work going to come in terms of brands reposition themselves um I completely agree agree with Nitin because I think the risk the engagement rule will change uh you will see PR agencies becoming content creators more so from our perspective of creating a lot of digital content on the knowledge side especially uh we are seeing all this innovation started happening already we are seeing that a lot of our peers are actually looking at new ways of making their clients communication go to other stakeholders and like I said that like earlier Nitin said uh there would be new opportunities that will emerge out of it and those new opportunities would be that a lot of companies we would would want to come back very strongly as the as uh I have a strong feeling that we are in for a there are different shapes of recession we are in for a v-shape recession where if you have actually seen a dip you will see a massive rise as well and in the time when the massive rise starts happening that is when our PR firms would come up very strongly because the repositioning of the brand working in terms of also talking on how the brands have actually uh been able to sail through this COVID period all this storytelling needs a communication of uh public relation that it would be required for brands to utilize I think strongly I strongly support what Nitin said with your thoughts would it would it can you hear me okay I'll just wait I think there's some audio uh I'll come to you we need first yes we need your thoughts on this yes we need can you hear me yeah okay sorry I thought that's followed the apologies so you know Nitin Kunal bang on historically if we really look at the years where the industries have slowed down the biggest breakdowns have happened PR has always grown I mean it's not right now this is of course really an unprecedented time but historically also if we really see whether it's a 2008 my down or 2012 whatever you know PR has grown and and I I'm strongly you know a believer that PR will come out stronger uh you know I'm I was just reading our story yesterday it wasn't half a bizarre and this is a china case story china opened on monday the french brand opened their stores on tuesday on a day one of that store opening the overall china had a sale of 2.7 million dollars if I really convert this is approximately 22 crore rupees sale in a day in china and I'm saying of course it's china but there is a positivity there are the people and I personally feel that things will come back and come back strongly for brands and if it happens for brands it's good for us apart from that of course because there are a couple of things which positives out of the the virus the whole covid issue is one we as a brand as a company as agencies as people we have become much better communicator we have learned how to communicate effectively and what is the and you know even in organizations internally we are communicating more we are talking more and I think that's gonna help us a lot in a wrong way mithin spoke about the traditional media versus digital of course digital is the future everybody understand that but traditional is gonna get more important importance because of the fake news there's the only way where you can go back to a rep check authenticate your news is the traditional way and and I think that's gonna go there's there is a bit of work we as an agencies and industries need to do on is this whole awareness side of online versus the print and I think the way things have moved print will take some time to come back to the normal or will never be able to come back to the normal these these are the you know the times will tell us this but I think from the clients point of view we need to look at doing some bit of awareness around that issue and I think otherwise post covid which I personally call it poco is gonna be a is gonna be a lifetime for the industry it's just question of time how and when right if you can hear me I was coming to you can you can you hear me I hope you can I can hear you can you yes okay so your thoughts on this I miss the question all right okay so so okay the question was that post the covid phase a lot of brands would try to reposition themselves do you think the PR agencies have a bigger goal to be yes absolutely we are I think I'm seeing a lot of things happening from now itself you know but and as a mid-sized firm and a growing firm we are working with a lot of startup clients a lot of b2b segment clients you know I'm amazed with the amount of maturity and the amount of you know they're coming back to us and saying you know okay they they want us to hand hold them and take us from you know and help them to go through the same you know through the situation so I believe we will play a very very vital role this is this is this is ultimately you know brands have to communicate they can't stop communicating at all right so today or tomorrow PR will play it is still playing and it will keep playing an important role for sure and as people were saying as the police were saying you know digital and today you know sorry traditional is going to be there for sure and digital agents I have received you know I'm disclosing this in the past three days I've received like six RFPs of on digital media that seems and and traditional media as well so that means that people are inclined to do PRs right now because they understand and they're preparing for post covid and they understand that PR will only help them to you know rebrand and take the entire image to a next level so therefore PR firms will play a very very vital role for sure. Aman your thoughts on this? Yeah so I think as I said I think everybody knows that industry will continue how it will shape up is something which as of right now is uncertain because what we are witnessing is not something which has happened in the past if I could look at and you know being in the healthcare sector the only thing which I could remember from my historical perspective is the the mid 90s when the HIV AIDS was one of the big public health crisis which happened and it changed the way things looked I think this is something which is of course much more bigger and it will therefore have a much bigger implication it will change the way people behave this will change the way people's attitude are and if people are the one which constitute the organization people are the one who consume information brands or how they sort of look at the world one of the first thing which we need to really think through is that as an as an institution and as an industry what kind of a role can we play in bringing that change at the organization level so the role will remain there it will change it will become much more insights driven so from that perspective this is the time to think about how we as an industry and how we as the members of the industry needs to emerge out of it and be much more relevant for the companies who would be looking for services which will be very very different from the way they are currently working with us I just want to mention that you can tweet using hashtag from webinar and also post your questions on fb.live and fb as well. Taranjit you are the same question to you just your thoughts on this how do you see the opportunity post covid for PR agencies actually let's start with during covid if you've not had a chance to grab a seat at the head table now's your chance now the chance for you to be the conscience of your client you know be the guiding light this is where you establish a route within the boardroom right so if you do that now you've got a great future ahead with those clients that you currently retain the ones uh that you're looking at post covid starting the market right now it's imperative that you look at which other industries that are developing right now which are the ones that are going to be on standstill which are the ones who are going to disappear and are going to be irrelevant from a customer point of view not just from the client's point of view you have to look at the overall sentiment of the nation based on that now is the time for you to start upstream right if you use this time during the lockdown to upstream yourself you've got a great future ahead be your quick thoughts sorry your audio is not i can't yeah i think what udit and the others say it is very true you know this is the time companies are realizing all brands are realizing that you can stop anything during a crisis but you can't stop communicating with your end consumer and other stakeholders communication is the key and that's where the role of a PR agency comes all the more into prominence we are like the we are we are more and more we are becoming more and more like trusted advisors to brands and i feel post covid if brands understand that this is where gradually the agency client relationship is emerging we are on a stronger wicked and what taranjit said is true right now most brands are realizing that there are different ways to communicate more and more verticals are emerging if you look at technology companies there are a lot of them which were considered b2b primarily earlier but now they are developing the consumer connect look at companies which are working in the virtual conference in space in the telemedicine space suddenly they have established the consumer connect and they are understanding the value of proper communication and good content and that's where the you know these new verticals will emerge as opportunities for PR agencies in the future after every crisis there's a you know there's a silver lining behind every cloud and i'm sure the agency will the agencies will also come out of this much more stronger definitely so and just remind that keep the questions coming the next question is Taran would be asking the next question yes yeah i am i already have room so thank you Rohil Lithin my question to you would be what is the advice that you have for the PR practitioners and the agencies in terms of communicating in these tough times i think to be true to your clients i think to like i said mentioned earlier really give you a strong excellent uninterrupted service to clients at this time um to i think take care of yourself i think it's a tough time i think we've seen we've seen in our whole industry that you know there are we it's a very young industry right a median age is probably the mid 20s i think i'm the only one of there in this time i think so um so um you know mental health is a big big issue right and i think we should all and including including us all of us who are you know CEOs of firms or leaders in the industry all look at how to manage that mental health piece uh from from from a from a from a business perspective um that's two and third i think um agencies personally should look at their look should look at their look at internally how best they can look at cost structures look at structuring restructuring how to best uh you know do a much uh get get really go get more more value out of the current system there that they work in you know whether it's cost cutting whatever it might be but the idea is to have good business quantity plans for yourself so i'll bucket them into those three areas clients people and business continuity for yourself and kunal your thoughts same question answer becomes repetitive but i'll try and give another version to it then you know yeah yeah i'll try telling the story differently absolutely um yeah actually if you look at from a perspective of what do we do uh and what do i recommend i would strongly recommend that we need to be hyper uh connected with our clients we need to help them understand that work from home is more productive we are trying to give them a seamless service so that's very critical so if you were talking to a client once in a week we should be talking every day that's one thing that i think uh during this lockdown lockdown period i strongly believe that that's should be the way and i don't think even post-lockdown people are going to start working from offices so in terms of engagement with client needs to be very high i strongly feel that people are doing a dual job right now uh uh when coming to office you were not responsible for your household uh work but now uh you're doing your household work as well as your own uh work so um uh it sometimes become tiring uh you might lose your cool so sometimes just breathe and tell yourself that this will pass by uh and uh two agencies i would say that um all of us and we've been discussing at industry level that uh we should plan uh our business in such a way that we can protect all our people uh to maximum level we things are uh difficult right now and we can't think of uh of a situation where we could let go of any of people who've been rallying with you for many years uh so uh it's very critical that how do you plan your uh business continuity without having any impact on uh the job continuity of people so that is one uh advice that while we plan uh do plan do keep this in mind and um also uh i think uh from an agency point of view what we are doing uh is we're utilizing a lot of tech uh which are available at a very minimal cost to actually effectively make our remote working look like they're working as a team so whether it's a in-house communication uh that we use for in form of workplace or uh the uh management of time that we use from time doctor so basically there are a lot of tech that is available right now which can make your uh workforce effectiveness much more than what uh you were doing at uh regular days so uh try and identify those technology try and implement that it'll help in your overall business uh so that's all my say thank you so Ahmed my question since you handle the indian and the international operations what advice do you have for the PR practices as well as the agencies of course well i think right now survive keep your head above the what uh ensure that you have scenarios mapped out for all possible timelines um i think if we just look at just about 115 days since the first corona virus was detected in december so if you look at from a timeline it's not really a very long timeline since this whole crisis started to pick up but the the road ahead is much more longer uh so whether this will remain for next 60 days whether it will remain for 90 days or whether it will go much more longer we need to uh be much more agile we need to be dynamic and we need to work with any possible scenarios which may come along our way and at that time to change our strategy to change the outlook and to change the way we operate uh is something which needs to be taken care of uh so that all aspects so you know and we have sort of talked about i think kunal also talked about the fact that the primary thing for us is to ensure that as an industry uh all members of the industry both at an organization and at the people level we are able to take along with us uh in the best possible manner manage the challenges which are coming our way and it's something which is true not just for india so if you look at you know across the asia where we operate um it's it's true uh the market in southeast asia they went in the lockdown much earlier than india and we thought you know they will be sort of you know coming back but then you had the second wave which has started to emerge in the southeast asian market so how this whole scenario will evolve i don't think uh anybody can predict and therefore uh to keep an eye on different scenarios uh is very very important what we may be saying today versus what may be happening next week can be two very different things and i think that's one of the reasons why as an industry we are you know conversing with each other almost on a weekly we are not almost we are all conversing every week to look at the change in the situation and therefore how do we need to adapt uh ourselves to that thank you so that your thoughts or your advice for the people the practitioners and the agencies yeah so i think three things uh one as an agency i would not say agency now i will say firm and we have been talking about it from a long time right so i will request all my colleagues to not say agency it is a firm right now uh so as a firm you know we will have to make up an excel sheet uh and and you know look at the cost look at all the fluff costs which were there which you were incurring get rid of it because things because what is more most important is uh is the talent right you will have to make sure that there is a business continuity and we keep the we keep retaining the talent for sure second for people i think uh this is the time to upgrade your skills right because this is not we are not going to do the same work which we were doing before covid the work is going to change and during covid also we can see there is a lot of digital requirements which is coming up there are a lot of uh you know policy uh requirements also would come up now so i think uh there has to be a lot of multitasking from people which has to happen for sure right uh you can't be doing the same old stuff which you were doing before and people who were not understanding it have have i think have understood it far better now third is you know keep the again you know the most important and which we which a lot of people forget is fitness i think for people it is very important to keep it because we are sitting at home and doing the same work every day uh you know sleeping eating and going of just opening the laptop and doing it i think what is more important is if you can follow a routine that that is very very important so three things uh that's that's something which i personally do i get up early or what how i was doing it before covid also and i'm doing the same thing i'm not uh keeping this as a situation to keep eating or keep drinking i'm i'm following the routine for sure and same thing is what i've been talking to my colleagues as well in the in the office so that's something which i believe everybody should do on a lighter note i think we should keep drinking whenever it's possible i agree beneath uh your thoughts are in many of your mute yeah so my friends have largely covered the whole gamut uh i have just two three points uh uh you know which which has been my personal learning and i feel uh it has changed quite a quite a bit of the industry the way things are operating uh one i believe very strongly the teams which are together during tough times uh will remain stronger and together for the longest time and this goes both for internal and external uh this also goes for the industry so the from the prc airpoint the statement is is i think we as a prci have a strong body now in last one month the way it has been operated so i'm repeating he's saying that because i'm really proud of that point number two the teams are internally very important and i think that's something which so so one thing which we have done is earlier we used to have time sheets or stuff like that there no pressures now there's more task oriented stuff which we are doing so people have their time i'm not uh you know so that's something which is working out well for us uh similarly with clients you'll be there with that you communicate more and everything so i think all of the those gonna help but apart from that what is working well for us with clients is we are engaging with clients and asking them to do more for the society so there are two things which are really gonna come out from or probably uh uh three things one media understanding the value of csr and csr is not something which i would want to say but the public private partnership you know the way companies have come out come forward i think that's commendable there are some bit of stories which have come out there are some stories which have not come out and will never come out but we know on ground the the way things have changed and the initiatives which have been taken in and i i think this will go for long it's not that the things will change overnight after the lockdown gets over or thing so it's gonna be a long way and post covid sorry the poco will definitely definitely have a lot of uh the public private partnerships going on and we'll get some good results second is the civil society i think this has also given us the value of civil society uh you know we have realized the kind of work which they have done on a grassroots and we as a communication people need to understand and probably work closely with and we we many a times work as a as a conduit between these two you know sort of organizations or these two industries which is civil society and the corporate and i think we need to really make sure that we work closely with all of them yeah that's what i have to say right thank you very so ruby i'm sorry before you go ahead i'll have to jump out nithin nithin before you move i have a quick question uh i will just jump this thing i have questions coming in and this is very uh i just want to answer this one question i'm sorry can you hear me yeah i can okay so in turn uh this is by uh jeena gosh uh from mumbai uh she's asking in terms of crisis communication is there a detailed communication advisory plan to sensitize brands on how to communicate sensitively on digital platforms is are you as an association planning and advisory uh no the association is not planning advisory uh what we have done is sent a letter for clients to all we've sent a letter to all members which they can send to the clients on how to react in the situation and also uh what what they can how they can work with agencies in this time i think all agencies have their own own way of dealing with crisis communications and i think even at this time we just i think the overall message is to be sensitive right because there have been many cases which we read and heard there were brands have been a bit insensitive around the current situation not only brands would also influence us so is there an advisory going on how brands should communicate no that's left for members but there is an advisory that's gone out for clients uh which covers broadly some of these four topics and also broadly covers on what kind of how agencies can or how as we said how firms can help or PR firms can help them thank you thank you thank you for a time thank you so much we need Aman Tarunji Ruby we look forward to more such engaging thanks sessions thank you yeah then thanks thank you so so Ruby my question you already do she at work and you have been uh you know communists doing stupendulous work in terms of working out with some of the leading clients so what is your advice if this uh scenario of covid and post-covid and what do you suggest agencies or you know the PR practitioner should manage the crisis at this time this time Ruby Ruby you need to remove during covid that we realize as uh PR practitioners is how important remote communication is and how important it's for the workplace to be fluent in technology so it's not like you always need a physical office and infrastructure and I think I'm realizing that clients are also understanding this very well that it's very easy to work with an agency remotely it's not every time that we have to go running to a client's office so that's one big learn that we've had and I've realized that even the junior most members of the team they are equally responsible you know they they are equally good at their work if you give them that ownership and responsibility but one thing that we should also understand as PR practitioners more is that you know during these times there are three things that we need to remember one is we have to be responsive you cannot ever tell a client or a consumer that you cannot that you cannot answer a question you are not available so these these are the times that you understand that you always have to be responsive and secondly you have to be innovative so covid has taught us ways to innovatively send out a message to the media and to media to our end consumers so people have understood that you cannot just go and barge the meet bother the media with any and every story pitch you have to find an angle whether the pitch goes as an impact story around covid or as a future impact story around covid etc and you position your story accordingly when you're pitching to the journalist all in all we understand that we also have to become come across as being empathetic and have a human touch when we are dealing be it with clients be it with the media etc so we should come across as sensitive individuals also and I think the the sensitive aspect of communication where we are working together to build that image of you know that good corporate image of trust for consumers amongst the larger audience that is something that covid has made us realize that corporate reputation is much bigger and corporate image is much bigger than day-to-day communication and it's made us realize the importance of having proper communication and content strategy to pick out this message. Thank you so Tarunjit your views and your advice. Thank you so I think pretty much everybody said almost everything but I'd like to draw everybody's attention on one of these jokes that has been floating around on WhatsApp now's the time we get to know which are the meetings that could have been a phone call yeah so this is the time I think my advice would only be for agencies while everybody's already already addressed clients and teams etc if you ever wanted to pivot this is the time yeah so the longest amount of time I think for the last 10 years we as PR professionals have been pushing our clients telling them digital is the way forward digital is the way forward but everybody wants KT front which I got yeah so this is the time for us now to and let them know what the importance of digital is right I think they're also opening up to the fact they're also opening up to the fact that oh yeah it is possible and it's possible to reach out to your target audience much better on digital as compared to traditional media while traditional media has its own set of challenges right now I think we as PR professionals this is the right time for us to help our clients draw the balance second if we ever wanted to change our business models this is the time to do that right the work from one policies that people have a certain number of agencies have a lot of them have kind of jumped on to it and started figuring out how that has to be done how accountability has to be put into place where that's concerned um so this is the time for us to relook at all the policies that we have and see where is where and what is it that we can cut down on and make sure that we sustain our businesses at this point yeah so I uh let's go to the audience questions now we have a lot of questions coming in and let's keep tweeting using the hashtag people and webinar you can also post real uh current I do also need to hop off in another five minutes so okay I'll come to you first I'll ask you a question uh the question is from um Sabi Khanna it's for you Mr Gupta how will marketing communication play to look like for clients post COVID well I think the post COVID the marketing communication has to be focused on a couple of things um I think the first is the uh the stakeholders will change um the employees as the brand ambassador and employees as a key stakeholder will emerge so therefore how you communicate with your employees will be essential I think the other group which usually was never thought about is but becoming very important now is your business partners so specifically for the industries which are across into manufacturing and who needs business partners to ensure that things get delivered so how do you really work closely with your business partners and communicate with them will be a necessity the the reputation and the repositioning of the brand post COVID and based on what the new world looks like will be another facility which needs to be done and and finally I think it would be all about that how do you create ecosystems where if repeat when you know when the dependence is on uh on the on the media which is outside uh there will be a lot of focus on owned means so companies and the brands will be really looking at investing into creating uh a lot of social and the digital uh channels creation of the owned content which they could therefore uh share with the communities uh their own brand communities uh this is kind of a thing which will be really uh which I believe will be happening now onwards till the time the new scenario of post COVID or Poco S Vinit has been saying I'll stick to that Poco okay thank you guys thank you guys thank you guys thanks for now Vinit Ruby Sanjeev my question to you is in this uh everybody gets a different question so that is one thing Kunal for you this is from uh Pramiti Sapu she's asking what are the different ways in which we can create faith within uh our stakeholders you know especially the clients during these times what are the best ways to maintain that relationship that we have been before this moment happen to keep it strong so your audio is missing okay it's very similar to what um you know in any crisis we do we need to first actually uh beyond uh beyond one is that we acknowledge that there is a situation which is unprecedented and which is what needs to be done with uh for with every organization that uh you you actually acknowledge that there is a problem and with the acknowledgement there is also a fact that uh like every human evolve with time every business evolve with time so there will be evolution that will be required during this crisis period so that what is that evolution plan do you have a plan to it is very much uh required for the leadership to actually convey to their different stakeholders and also uh talk about your human side of the business so for example uh a lot of companies are coming right now out uh to help uh government to help uh citizen and also provide uh whatever support they they can uh in this testing time so one is acknowledgement of the issue second is a plan on how you're evolving the business so that your stakeholders should be engaged in this your stakeholders should understand that there is a plan uh for uh dealing with this situation and third is how are you are responding to this particular crisis and how do you're contributing to this particular crisis to the overall society these are three critical things which will help your each stakeholders which are around you to have faith in you and to have much more faith uh on the organization um I want to be sure the Twitter handle which is hashtag I want to come to you can you have me yeah I can there's some connecting problems happening I've just so so the question for you for you is from snake the question is what are the new kind of distal PR platforms or tools that have emerged and may become relevant in the coming times the question is from snake what are the new kinds of distal PR platforms or new tools that we have discovered recently during this period that can become stay relevant for the I think every social tool has to be relevant for the coming times right it is it is just about communicating right if if if I am I'm able to communicate via Facebook via Twitter via LinkedIn and I'm reaching direct to the target audience that's that's the tool to go for right it depends on what's your strategy is what what do you want to achieve out of a communication strategy so I believe what I I meant about upgrading the skills was that everybody needs to be now become an integrated we as a firm need to become an integrated firm rather than just being a traditional firm because via becoming integrated firm we are solving the business objectives of the client right so that is more most important uh so I think every social media tool is important you can't have a categorized that okay this Facebook is important social media Twitter or LinkedIn every tool would play a very very important role in the coming times and just these tools are currently playing an important role for sure right look at look at we are not receiving newspapers we are receiving online copies of newspaper all the new age media has become important relevant I have seen your story going to do a lot of live sessions now in 42 is doing you guys are doing it so I think every everything is going to stop but we have to adopt to the challenges right we need to come up with a solution and that's what we are doing in a normal circumstance we would have this panel uh during IPR CCA in an event and discussing about different things right over here we're connected and we are talking to 100 odd people so these are these are new tools right so we we have uh we have quickly adopted to the new tools and technologies uh and uh humans are very intelligent they will come out with a solution for sure and we are trying to come thank you that so Vinita I have a question for you this is from Tanishk Adhaulia she's asking something about you know there is a series of layoffs happening across industries a lot of new talent is on the market on the block but because there is a freeze on hiring some of them are feeling disheartened and demotivated so what is your you know thoughts about this and what do you what is your message to these people out there I think the only message right now is be positive as the industry I believe you know PR industry has not done any detachment right now and we are very conscious about it all our restructuring what we have done is to keeping in mind to make sure that all our current employees are sustained and retained so that has been the core approach as far as the industry is concerned and I believe it's commendable the way we all have come together to take certain calls that's point number one as far as new jobs are concerned they are on a horizon right now they are not there but another probably of four to eight weeks once the markets open up there are uh new jobs gonna come up people we we also have delayed our hiring plans so it's not that we have shared those hiring plans so you need to just keep waiting be positive and also if you can really do is enhance your skills this is the time and this is the what we as a company we are doing we are putting more you know there are resources it is time where resources are crunched but there are always things available to trains we are doing a lot of in-house training and I I believe very important for all the future employees who are looking for jobs to enhance their skills this is the time they know what is required and uh and I think uh Udit rightly said the future is also for integrated communication and I think uh that integration has to come in there could be and this is my personal feeling because uh in whatever by the time we finish it would be one and a half months of uh lockdown inside the house there could be little fatigue digital fatigue which will come in into all of us and which is probably temporary you know I'm sure you would want to say enough of Facebook or enough of Twitter and once the markets open up you would want to really go back enjoy that working from office and the teams and everything so there could be a digital initially but I think the lifestyle is going to change drastically people going to consume more and more content digitally and it could be online as a news platform so even if the traditional media online platforms are or otherwise if you really look at all the social media platforms are the new ways of uh reaching out uh is all of them going to be very but I have a advice for people uh I have advice for people who are fresh coming out fresh out of college uh you should see every crisis as an opportunity every time and the the industry is going through or an economy is going through a recession you see emergence of many startups who've become billion dollar ten years later whether it was Flipkart or any other company they started in the peak of recession so I would say uh you have an opportunity you are from a communication industry you have an opportunity to become a single person media shop which my uh my dean used to say uh when I picked up mass communication okay and become content creator right now you can actually try and actually utilize this time in becoming a content creator and content of your choice which is of your area of interest you never know uh you might find yourself uh a career uh that you've created for your own self by becoming a influencer uh in the space because if you'll see the report influencers engagement has actually gone much higher during this covid time and uh their effectiveness is much higher people are looking at the content that the influencers are making so use this time uh if there are no jobs be the job creator yourself utilize the time effectively I have a question yeah um so I'd like to add to the job question um if you are looking for a job right now then you need to study the market right study the market and figure out which other agencies that are handling verticals that are doing well in covid and will do well post covid it's your responsibility to make sure that you study the market and apply to those agencies those agencies are hiring yeah second when you go for a job help them understand what is it that you bring to the table that will help them make profit and move ahead with their clients what is the expertise that you bring to the table a job will not just land on your you know on your lap you have to prove to the employer why you deserve that job so upskill yourself make sure that you are cleared in your communication in terms of what you've done to the table I have a question for you uh this is from Shanke Bhattavad he is asking what should organizations from real estate keep in mind uh what kind of PR and social media strategy should be followed by those players right now the real estate market right yes in the real estate market one of the biggest issues that is happening right now is uh the migrant laborers right uh so if as a real estate client um you know you can't really talk about a new property that will be a little bit of a beantone death if you can address the migrant labor issue if you can make sure that that is something that your client can address and be sensitive be kind and be empathetic towards them I think you've got a lot of need for good media stories that will be relevant to the media right now now is not the time to launch a new campaign now is the time to be kind another question for Ruby yeah so Ruby so I have I have a question uh by uh you know Chetale sorry this is actually was so you know there is a question by Manpreet for uh asking you what do you think about the fake news that is spreading all around even on the media group that media is losing job and everyone is facing but half of the time is Rubar are just scaring people although we covered it just now about what the industry is doing that is one second question I want to ask is that you know there's so many digital session and discussion are happening on these kind of platform so how do you think such discussions are relevant and how do you on the other hand since you're doing client servicing how do you you know convince your client that this is the time because most of the time I've been hearing you that some clients have even stopped their PR campaigns and activity so how are you convincing your client that this is exactly is the time that they should be emphasizing more on PR outreach than you know kind of taking a back step in an answer to your first question you're right uh you know uh when we as PR practitioners whenever there's a negative news about our client in the media the first thing we do is call up the media house and say why didn't you check me why didn't you validate why didn't you take my point of view so and so spreading fake news in any form through a WhatsApp anything is as dangerous as the virus we all know so uh as responsible PR practitioners we should be very careful when we get an alert like this instead of immediately forwarding it to our friends or our team members we should just do a quick check with our media friends as to whether this news is true or not that we at least we can act as responsible PR practitioners and partners of the media partners with the media instead of creating panic in industry so because if anything happens in the media industry there's a repercussion in the PR industry also so at least being responsible about that and being sensitive and human that there are people at the other end whose livelihoods and reputations are being impacted would really help in answer to your second question how are we convincing clients you know so clients are increasingly also realizing we are trying to make clients understand and I think most of them are realizing to be relevant to their audience their consumers at this point of time they can't stop communicating they have to find the right news peg and try to communicate with the client also a lot of our clients especially in the technology space and we do work with some brands which you know which have not really been in the forefront in terms of news they're realizing it's a good time to build that human connect with with the consumer so we are customizing the messaging accordingly as well as you're trying to see that they get that trust with the consumers for a lot of CSR campaigns are happening and we're trying to build up that human image for them so we work with an industry body and we're trying to see talk about how that industry body is impacting lives of people during this crisis how they are a lifeline for the for all of India during this point of time so I think clients are also understanding and they're also becoming open open to newer forms of communication so instead of traditional press conferences they're also getting open to webinars etc and for communicating with the media and other stakeholders thank you Ruby so Rohail let's wrap up yes thank you everyone I mean we thank you in the interest of time we have to call it we have ended here and thank you everyone thank you everyone who logged in and thank you everyone for taking out your precious time that too on a working day interesting is I could see more than almost at a peak it was approximately 150 people who were part of this and I think it's pretty impressive I'm happy you know and I'm sure we all have learned something out of this session yeah it's been a wonderful session for everybody please also make E4M please also make hashtag E4MPR webinar you know famous let's let's make hashtag Poco as an Indian PR industry you know sort of a gift to the world hashtag Poco thank you thank you thank you