Mary Nnah
In commemoration of its 25th anniversary C&F Porter Novelli, a strategic communication firm, recently held a media training workshop for journalists in Nigeria on personal and professional branding as part of the effort in boosting its media partnership and enhancing professionalism.
While addressing participants at the virtual workshop, the Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, C&F Porter Novelli, Tony Ajero, urged media practitioners to continuously hone their reporting skills, and also seek innovative ways to carve a niche for themselves in the profession.
He averred that the personal and professional branding workshop for journalists was organised to empower the media with the tools they need to continuously seek innovative ways to scale their reporting skills even after they exit the industry.
Speaking on the CSR initiative, Ajero, said the move was driven by its “Public Relations for Good” mantra, stating that the training for journalists and academy are some of the ways the company is giving back to society.
He explained why personal and professional branding was important to the career growth of every journalist.
“With everything about life’s progress and development, branding is important for all media practitioners as it involves one’s identity, character and reputation.
“Personal branding is critical to not only business success, but professional and personal development. It starts with me: ‘Who I Am’ produces ‘Who I Want To Be.’ As a result, the process of getting to where we want to be must be intentional every step of the way.”
He stated further that to build one’s personal and professional brand, detailed attention must be paid to the six Ps of Marketing which is: Product, packaging, promotion, pricing, placement and positioning, as well as the identity, that will breed knowledge; character, that will lead to actions; and reputation, which will bring about the intended results.
“It all starts with identity! Every individual must be able to answer these questions: Who am I? Where am I coming from? Where am I going? What are my strengths/weaknesses? Where are the opportunities for me? Where are the threats to success? Who/what will help me get to my goals?’’
He said it had become imperative for media practitioners to skill up and look for ways to distinguish themselves through personal branding and conscious reputation capital development.
Ajero explained further that in commemoration of its 25th anniversary, the company introduced some Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives to celebrate its various stakeholders and partners in progress.
According to him, such an initiative is a give-back initiative to Mrs. Rose Julius, the Nigerian pensioner who displayed patriotism by donating her monthly pension to the Buhari government and an Academy for Business Communication (ABC) West Africa, a platform for training young Nigerian undergraduates for free on Communication and Public Relations.
“C&F Porter Novelli saw the need to put Mrs. Rose Julius on a monthly allowance as a way of encouraging patriotism and rewarding actions such as those taken by Mrs. Julius in 2016 to support the Buhari administration’s anti-corruption war.
“Mrs. Julius who retired as a cleaner from the Lagos University Teaching Hospital, in 2016, reportedly donated her entire monthly pension of N10,000 to support the administration’s war against corruption and pledged to contribute N1,000 every month towards the rehabilitation of the Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) as her way of encouraging the federal government to restore the lost glory of Nigeria and curb corruption in the country.
“The company has decided to remit the sum of N10,000 every month to Mrs. Julius for as long as she lives”, he said.
