Managing strategically: Canadian federal government communication branches evaluated against five of the Generic Principles of Public Relations

Résumé

The Government of Canada employs over 4000 public relations/communication specialists at the federal, national political level. These practitioners are public servants, employed by a government department or agency, with the vast majority working in a designated unit called a communication branch. Since 2000, in order to compare management practices between and among these discrete communication branches, four comprehensive government-wide benchmarking studies were conducted. From a review of three of these studies’ findings, this paper examines the practice of strategic management by Government of Canada communication branches and their heads, in particular the concept of managing strategically. Five of the generic principles, part of the General Theory of Excellent Public Relations and derived from the work of the Excellence Project, are tested. Evidence from the findings of these benchmarking studies suggests that Government of Canada communication branches indeed were managed strategically by 2008.

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