Master of Science / Department of Journalism and Mass Communications / William Adams / This is an exploratory study on the existing transition efforts of the Kansas State University Graduate School for master’s degree students. There are a variety of graduate students at Kansas State University with many different graduate program experiences. This study identifies the current status of incoming master’s degree students outreach and details experiences of transitioning graduate students to make suggestions on future strategies. It is vital to identify if, and which, programs are catering to the different needs of these students during their socialization into their graduate program. The study has three main objectives: (1) determine the level of personal contact and emphasis on relationship-building during a master’s degree student’s transition, (2) identify the general efforts and practices of specific master’s degree programs and the Kansas State University Graduate School, and (3) to document the needs of students as they transition into graduate school at Kansas State University. The research was conducted through use of confidential one-on-one in-depth interviews with nine Kansas State University graduate program directors and two Graduate School administrators. Ten newly admitted to the Kansas State University graduate program in the spring of 2013 were interviewed. The qualitative approach to this study enabled the researcher to get detailed testimonials and experience-based knowledge from all of these key stakeholders. Overall, the study revealed that graduate students value face-to-face and personal interaction and showed that student-to-student contact is a preferred component to a successful socialization of graduate students. The needs of transitioning graduate students included assistance with course scheduling, assistantship responsibilities, advisor selection, and an overall understanding that graduate school is different from undergraduate school. Future graduate program strategies that would assist in the successful socialization of graduate students include: orientations, meeting with graduate program directors, social and networking opportunities, and workshops. Involvement in student organizations and utilization of on-campus resources are also a part of most of the graduate programs, and graduate school transition outreach. Based on the findings of this study, the researcher offers suggestions to the Graduate School, graduate programs, and incoming students in order to help enhance the transition experience of master’s degree students into graduate school at Kansas State University.

Text in English / In its proposal of a communication strategy that will be of use as an enabling tool for increasing graduate employment potential, this study contributes uniquely to the discipline of communication. It envisages that communication takes into consideration the involvement of the key stakeholders, namely: government, labour market, education system, and media. Amid unemployment challenges that affect the majority of the population, media is regarded as a powerful tool to reach the majority of the population. With specific regard to graduate unemployment, media-driven interaction with unemployed graduates is not as efficient as it should be. Factors contributing to graduate unemployment are identified as career choices, skills shortage, job opportunities, career development, work experience, skills development, entrepreneurial skills, internships, and access to the labour market. It is also important to note that media is regarded as tool for disseminating information about such factors. In order to address this problem, the study establishes an integrated communication strategy that will be of use as an enabling tool for increasing the potential of graduate employment. The role of such communication could be applicable in various ways, such as organisational communication, business communication, public communication, personal communication, interpersonal communication, etc. This study locates itself in the domain of public communication because information about unemployment issues is a matter of public concern. This study adopts mixed research methodologies, with a survey research design—in order to gather data from the graduate students at a University of Technology. The study found that while social and print media are highly preferred and used due to their accessibility, there is a need to stress their use with regard to employment search. The main concepts that contributed to the establishment of the strategy included strategic communication, unemployment and media. It must be here noted that, for purposes of this study, strategic communication was informed by a confluence of the constitutive model of communication, systems theory, and situational theory of publics. The phenomenon of unemployment is informed by unemployment approaches, on the one hand, and the Maslow theory of needs, on the other. Furthermore, the understanding of the concept of media is informed by mass communication approaches and media richness theory. This thesis expects that, as an outcome, such a communication strategy would increase graduate employment potential. Public relations planning model is applied in the study in order to guide the implementation of the proposed communication strategy. / Communication Science / D. Litt. et Phil. (Communication Science)

No description available.

Every organization has a corporate image (beyond its control) which is mainly formed by its corporate identity (which it can control). This means that organizations have to manage their images. A positive image is particularly important for non-profit organizations, since these organizations depend on the goodwill of their publics for their existence. NG Welsyn is a well known welfare organization, famous for its bond with the Dutch Reformed church. Its two main sources of income, namely the state and members of the church have different opinions about the spending of funds. The state expects NG Welsyn to play a role in transformation, while members of the church want their needs to be catered for first. This, along with the decrease in funds from church members forced NG Welsyn to research its image among Dutch Reformed church members. In order to determine the image of NG Welsyn, an external public relations audit was formed through the use of questionnaires, focus groups and semi-structured interviews. Theoretical knowledge with regard to corporate image and identity as well as attitude formation was used as theoretical framework within the context of strategic communication management by non-profit organizations. The attitudes of church members on the elements of corporate identity were researched to determine the organization's image. The results show that the church members don't have a positive or negative image of NG Welsyn, since they don't have enough information about the organization. There is currently no relationship between the two parties. The main conclusion is that NG Welsyn can improve its image by the strategic management of communication with important publics. / Thesis (M.A. (Communication Studies))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2005.

Every organization has a corporate image (beyond its control) which is mainly formed by its corporate identity (which it can control). This means that organizations have to manage their images. A positive image is particularly important for non-profit organizations, since these organizations depend on the goodwill of their publics for their existence. NG Welsyn is a well known welfare organization, famous for its bond with the Dutch Reformed church. Its two main sources of income, namely the state and members of the church have different opinions about the spending of funds. The state expects NG Welsyn to play a role in transformation, while members of the church want their needs to be catered for first. This, along with the decrease in funds from church members forced NG Welsyn to research its image among Dutch Reformed church members. In order to determine the image of NG Welsyn, an external public relations audit was formed through the use of questionnaires, focus groups and semi-structured interviews. Theoretical knowledge with regard to corporate image and identity as well as attitude formation was used as theoretical framework within the context of strategic communication management by non-profit organizations. The attitudes of church members on the elements of corporate identity were researched to determine the organization's image. The results show that the church members don't have a positive or negative image of NG Welsyn, since they don't have enough information about the organization. There is currently no relationship between the two parties. The main conclusion is that NG Welsyn can improve its image by the strategic management of communication with important publics. / Thesis (M.A. (Communication Studies))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2005.

Studien undersöker samt diskuterar vilka kommunikationsstrategier ideella organisationer använder för att nå externa intressenter och svarar på följande frågor: Vilka kommunikationsstrategier använder ideella organisationer för att nå externa intressenter? Finns likheter respektive skillnader i hur ideella organisationer kommunicerar, vilka? Studiens teoretiska ramverk bygger på ideella organisationers möjligheter samt utmaningar med perspektiv på strategisk kommunikation. Den primära metod som används är en kvalitativ textanalys av Cancerfondens samt Ung Cancers hemsida då vi granskar hur organisationerna strategiskt arbetar i sin kommunikation. Textanalysen kombineras med kvalitativa samtalsintervjuer och används som komplement för att lyfta samt stödja resonemang. Resultatet visar att Cancerfonden och Ung Cancer på olika vis är duktiga kommunikatörer inom ramen för ett gott anseende. Cancerfonden med fokus på forskningsfinansiering och kunskapsspridning är transparenta och konsistenta i sin kommunikation då statistiska redogörelser och resultat genomsyrar hemsidan. Ung Cancer låter på ett systematiskt sätt integrera frivilliga i kommunikationsprocessen och gör sig mer mottaglig samt öppen för dialog med externa intressenter, vilket resulterar i mer intima relationer med medlemmar. Vad som förenar organisationerna är deras initiativ att göra skillnad. Trots lika engagemang mynnar deras visioner ut i olika spår därmed krävs olika kommunikationsstrategier i den externa kommunikationen.

This dissertation thesis titled 'Government Communication in the Czech Republic: Or- ganisation, Perception, and New Theoretical Model' is a seminal, exploratory work which contextualizes and maps the development of government communication in the Czech Republic from its foundation to the present time with a primary research emphasis on the years between 2015 and 2017. Stemming from interdisciplinary theoretical sources within media and communication, public policy, and management scholarship, the thesis rede- fines the way of thinking about government communication. It applies stakeholder theory paradigm by researching government institutions, private sector, and news media as three important actors of government communication. Analysing the organization, perception, and tensions of government communication, the dissertation thesis aims to introduce new theoretical model of government communication and provide the government, private sector, and other societal actors with challenging perspectives on their practices and status quo.

This year will be the 110th since the first time that athletes ran the exact distance of 42.195 km at the Olympic Games in London, the length known today as the standard distance for a marathon. Since then, the world of distance competitions has gone through remarkable transformations in structure, vision, strategy and location. Attending distance running events is a social global phenomenon, and thousands became hundreds of thousands in terms of participation rate. Starting 1980 the sport communication research experienced an exponential growth due to fast technological changes in sport events organization and promotion channels. The aim of this current research is to study the role of strategic communication in attracting amateur runners to engage in distance races, and the concept of Intelligence-led PR and its functionality during the challenges faced by PR practitioners. The concept is part of strategic communication theory and it has a key role in the communication process due to the significant social and economic impact of these events on the participants’ life and on the local markets. The study will focus on the content and data analysis of two distance running competitions organized in 2016 in Romania. The data collection was made by conducting two interviews with the representatives of the biggest sport event organizers in Romania - Bucharest RUNNING Club Association and Media Production Group, and examining several market reports. The main conclusions of this Master thesis are that research and planning, as well as using modern communication tools and new technologies, as part of strategic communication, have helped the big sport event organizers to reach targeted audiences, form and shape public’s perception about recreational activities and engage people to participate in running competitions. Another finding is that PR Intelligence, as a concept of strategic communication, is represented by a set of knowledge that can be gained both by education and relevant practice and makes this type of communication essential for an organization becoming one of the essential managerial functions. / <p>I would like to show my gratitude for the support I received from Bucharest RUNNING Club Association and Media Production Group Romania in conducting this study. Likewise, I express my hope that this research will be a useful input to the current literature in the sport communication area and strategic communication and it will be considered as inspiration for further research, and at the same time it will bring additional knowledge to other PR practitioners.</p>

The aim of this study is to contribute with knowledge regarding how artificial intelligence (AI) can be used as a tool for communicators, as well as what impact the use of AI will have on the field of strategic communication in Sweden. By using a qualitative interview method, we have captured the knowledge and speculations in this subject amongst four prominent professionals within the field of communications who also have knowledge and experience with AI. The results showed that AI can be used as a useful tool in a variety of communicational tasks including data collection, automatization of communication, curation and production of media content. AI implementation will affect strategic communications, as it will become more about the users experience and service design, as well as representing and creating trust for the organization. Coveted competencies within the field will be skills such as human interaction and strategic thinking, to complement the shortcomings of AI.

El presente trabajo analiza la percepción sobre la comunicación interna por parte de los trabajadores pertenecientes al sector servicios. Asimismo, este aspecto se analizará en el contexto actual que se vive en el país, respecto a la pandemia mundial del Coronavirus o también conocido como Covid-19, la cual está afectando a los trabajadores peruanos. También, se pretende, estudiar los canales de comunicación internos, la cultura y el clima de la organización del sector servicios con el fin de conocer la percepción de sus colaboradores con respecto a estos factores en tiempos del Covid-19. En esa misma línea, en el estudio se analiza el impacto que posee la comunicación interna en la organización, así como también se estudia la relación entre la comunicación interna y la percepción de los trabajadores, así como la relación que presentan los canales de comunicación, la cultura y el clima organizacional con la percepción de los trabajadores. La empresa analizada para este estudio, de enfoque cualitativo, es Química Express, en la cual se realizarán entrevistas a profundidad a los integrantes del equipo de la empresa, incluyendo al Sub Gerente General. La finalidad de esta técnica es conocer de manera detallada la percepción de los trabajadores frente a los cambios presentados en este contexto de incertidumbre referentes a la comunicación interna de su organización. / This paper analyses the perception of internal communication by workers belonging to the service sector. Likewise, this aspect will be analyzed in the current context that the country is experiencing, regarding the global Coronavirus pandemic or also known as Covid-19, which is affecting Peruvian workers. Also, it is intended to study the internal communication channels, the culture and the organizational climate of the service sector organization in order to know the perception of its collaborators regarding these factors in times of Covid-19. The organization analyzed for this study is Quimica Express, in which in-depth interviews will be conducted with members of the company's team, including the Deputy General Manager. The purpose of this technique is to know in a detailed way the perception of the workers in front of the changes presented in this context of uncertainty regarding the internal communication of their organization. / Trabajo de investigación