17th Swiss PR Symposium: New beginnings after the crisis - opportunities and motivation
Even in times of crisis, opportunities arise—and motivation plays a major role in this. At this year’s 17th Swiss PR Symposium in Bern, it became clear once again that even times of change are more effective when approached thoughtfully.
Recognizing opportunities and generating motivation plays a particularly important role here. Through the various presentations, the participants learned how associations, universities, agencies, companies and private individuals are seizing their opportunities and making a fresh start after the crisis.
Thomas Daum, Director of the Swiss Employers' Association, described Switzerland's situation based on the free movement of persons and emphasized how important this is for Switzerland, especially in difficult economic times. For him, our country is in a good starting position to take advantage of the opportunities in the period of recovery after the crisis. Switzerland's long-term position for success must not be gambled away by questioning the strengths of our location or suppressing urgent problems. We must tackle the restructuring of the social security system in financially good years. This will give us more leeway through longer transition periods. Otherwise, we could face a much bigger crisis in ten to twenty years' time.
According to Philippe Bardet, Director of the Interprofession du Gruyère, the association of cheese varieties is taking a completely different approach. His presentation on "How can a cheese with a long tradition and good reputation continue to be sold during the crisis" showed how the advantages of a long-term image boost, a focus on long-standing tradition and quality with a strong label can help a product to continue to be sold successfully even in difficult times.
Prof. Dr. Paul Burger heads the "Sustainability Research Program" at the University of Basel. He spoke about how differently sustainability is understood and how important it is therefore that sustainable development is not a discourse on conservation, but on innovation. Based on background problems, he described the global challenges and the development dilemma facing us, our children and their children. His wish is therefore for social development to be decoupled from resource consumption. In his opinion, societies will only be able to meet the existing challenges through substantial, institutional, social, economic and technical innovation within an ecological framework.
Franz Nietlispach overcomes a completely different crisis in his life every day. The Head of Sports Sponsoring at Novartis International AG and wheelchair athlete became a multiple Paralympic champion despite his disability and used "change as an opportunity". In his speech and a short film about his life, Nietlispach impressively demonstrated how much strength and motivation were needed to achieve these great feats. He also gave hope to those who would describe their situation as hopeless. According to him, some doors may close in a crisis, but many new ones usually open.
Crises are part of everyday life in sport. Every point lost calls the team, but also the coach and the management team, into question. But every new victory is also an opportunity and, above all, a great source of motivation for those involved. Dr. Urs Linsi, Chairman of the Board of Directors and CEO of Neue Grasshopper Fussball AG, showed in his presentation entitled "It takes a special sporting spirit!" how GC is heading into the future with the strategy "young, bold and committed". A football club experiences crises time and again, and GC has also been at rock bottom several times. But according to Linsi, you have to be able to take your chances, go on the offensive and score goals again.
Francesco Lurati, Professor of Corporate Communication at the Facoltà di Scienze della Comunicazione, Università della Svizzera italiana, showed how competent training is particularly important and helpful in times of crisis. Switzerland is less academicized than other European countries. He demonstrated the number of existing specialist certificates and diplomas in communication with impressive figures and informed the symposium participants about the professional needs and expectations of companies and agencies for future communication specialists. The high requirements can also be explained by the fact that nowadays communication strategies are no longer presented to the CCO, but directly to the CEO.
At the end of the event, moderator Bernhard Schär asked PR-suisse President Regula Ruetz how badly the communications industry had been hit by the crisis. According to Ruetz, the PR industry was much less or hardly affected in contrast to the advertising industry, newspaper publishers with a slump in job and image advertisements and advertising agencies such as Publicitas, APG, etc.. This is because advertising budgets are usually cut first, whereas various PR disciplines such as internal communication, crisis and issue management are in particular demand.
After another musical intermezzo by the duo Schweizer Roosen, Regula Ruetz thanked the many members who support the concerns of PR suisse, because it is thanks to their commitment that the association is what it is today. Afterwards, the President invited the participants to a concluding aperitif riche and thanked the speakers, the moderator and the participants for their interest.
The 17th Swiss PR Symposium was organized by the BR-SPRV professional register of the Swiss Public Relations Association (SPRV). The main sponsors of the conference were the Swiss PR Institute (SPRI), News aktuell and ZMS Media Monitoring. Details of the program as well as the individual presentations and photos from the event can be found on the website of the BR-SPRV professional register www.br-sprv.ch.
Thomas Daum, Director of the Swiss Employers' Association, described Switzerland's situation based on the free movement of persons and emphasized how important this is for Switzerland, especially in difficult economic times. For him, our country is in a good starting position to take advantage of the opportunities in the period of recovery after the crisis. Switzerland's long-term position for success must not be gambled away by questioning the strengths of our location or suppressing urgent problems. We must tackle the restructuring of the social security system in financially good years. This will give us more leeway through longer transition periods. Otherwise, we could face a much bigger crisis in ten to twenty years' time.
According to Philippe Bardet, Director of the Interprofession du Gruyère, the association of cheese varieties is taking a completely different approach. His presentation on "How can a cheese with a long tradition and good reputation continue to be sold during the crisis" showed how the advantages of a long-term image boost, a focus on long-standing tradition and quality with a strong label can help a product to continue to be sold successfully even in difficult times.
Prof. Dr. Paul Burger heads the "Sustainability Research Program" at the University of Basel. He spoke about how differently sustainability is understood and how important it is therefore that sustainable development is not a discourse on conservation, but on innovation. Based on background problems, he described the global challenges and the development dilemma facing us, our children and their children. His wish is therefore for social development to be decoupled from resource consumption. In his opinion, societies will only be able to meet the existing challenges through substantial, institutional, social, economic and technical innovation within an ecological framework.
Franz Nietlispach overcomes a completely different crisis in his life every day. The Head of Sports Sponsoring at Novartis International AG and wheelchair athlete became a multiple Paralympic champion despite his disability and used "change as an opportunity". In his speech and a short film about his life, Nietlispach impressively demonstrated how much strength and motivation were needed to achieve these great feats. He also gave hope to those who would describe their situation as hopeless. According to him, some doors may close in a crisis, but many new ones usually open.
Crises are part of everyday life in sport. Every point lost calls the team, but also the coach and the management team, into question. But every new victory is also an opportunity and, above all, a great source of motivation for those involved. Dr. Urs Linsi, Chairman of the Board of Directors and CEO of Neue Grasshopper Fussball AG, showed in his presentation entitled "It takes a special sporting spirit!" how GC is heading into the future with the strategy "young, bold and committed". A football club experiences crises time and again, and GC has also been at rock bottom several times. But according to Linsi, you have to be able to take your chances, go on the offensive and score goals again.
Francesco Lurati, Professor of Corporate Communication at the Facoltà di Scienze della Comunicazione, Università della Svizzera italiana, showed how competent training is particularly important and helpful in times of crisis. Switzerland is less academicized than other European countries. He demonstrated the number of existing specialist certificates and diplomas in communication with impressive figures and informed the symposium participants about the professional needs and expectations of companies and agencies for future communication specialists. The high requirements can also be explained by the fact that nowadays communication strategies are no longer presented to the CCO, but directly to the CEO.
At the end of the event, moderator Bernhard Schär asked PR-suisse President Regula Ruetz how badly the communications industry had been hit by the crisis. According to Ruetz, the PR industry was much less or hardly affected in contrast to the advertising industry, newspaper publishers with a slump in job and image advertisements and advertising agencies such as Publicitas, APG, etc.. This is because advertising budgets are usually cut first, whereas various PR disciplines such as internal communication, crisis and issue management are in particular demand.
After another musical intermezzo by the duo Schweizer Roosen, Regula Ruetz thanked the many members who support the concerns of PR suisse, because it is thanks to their commitment that the association is what it is today. Afterwards, the President invited the participants to a concluding aperitif riche and thanked the speakers, the moderator and the participants for their interest.
The 17th Swiss PR Symposium was organized by the BR-SPRV professional register of the Swiss Public Relations Association (SPRV). The main sponsors of the conference were the Swiss PR Institute (SPRI), News aktuell and ZMS Media Monitoring. Details of the program as well as the individual presentations and photos from the event can be found on the website of the BR-SPRV professional register www.br-sprv.ch.
