How important is trust to you?

Trust. A quality imperative to any good relationship, be it business or personal. A quality which can take years to build, but can be lost in a matter of seconds. Once lost, the process of regaining it can sometimes be impossible. Oh the importance of trust.

In terms of business trust, one could talk of brand loyalty. You buy something because you trust the quality and experience of it. But where does this trust come from? A friend or colleague? A magazine? Facebook? A newspaper? This is where PR can come in and help start and then build this trust to gain a market share of voice. But what happens when trust begins to fall?

Bankers. Do we trust bankers? What do we think of BP? The government? Nestle? Primark? The BBC? Well thanks to the recent launch of Edelman’s 2011 Trust Barometer; banks, financial Services and media are all stuck at the bottom of UK Industry Rankings. Are we surprised? Um probably not after the financial crisis and the ever-growing bonuses earned by the tax-payer’s money…cue RBS. Cuts here and cuts there and still graduate unemployment at its all time lowest – god society sounds so miserable! No wonder with the media headlining all things negative. According to the Barometer, in response to “How much do you trust media to do what is right?” The US is down to 27% and the UK 22%. How low can you go? But in contrast, and perhaps surprisingly so, trust in the CEO has significantly increased since last year’s survey.

All things aren’t as doom and gloom as society can sometimes make out. Trust is evidently an important issue because it can be detrimental to a business’s reputation, to a person’s reputation. Therefore transparency and honesty are becoming more widely practiced – that’s a good thing right?

Find out more at http://www.edelman.com/trust/2011/

Making a difference in Healthcare

And so another one bites the dust! Four rotations down, two more to go. The finishing line is in sight. Yet again, it’s been a learning curve five weeks, working in an environment completely separate in terms of specialty and overall culture. For one thing, it is incredibly female dominated. No wonder the Healthcare team is the favourite amongst other departments! Some seemed rather jealous of me working here – I wonder why…

Well it could be due to the all-round personality of the team. They are the most supportive I’ve come across so far – you even have two line managers, and workload has never been a problem. They are an incredibly friendly, intelligent bunch and are always present at the bar on Thursday – now that’s my kind of team! Happy to help with any questions, but what is most striking is that they are always on call to help each other. Teamwork to a Tee.

Maybe it could be due to their clients. Healthcare is the ‘big bucks’! With leading pharmaceutical companies as clients, the revenue this department brings in is phenomenal, especially being run on a global scale. I guess this makes one more diligent and cautious in any task, however routine or new. It heightens the importance of your work. I certainly felt it!

Or it could be down to what this work actually encompasses. How many people can say they make a difference to peoples’ lives through the work they do? Not many. Seeing and understanding the effects of medical treatments created by the Edelman pharma clients makes your work all the more worthwhile. From helping to raise awareness of pneumococcal disease, to the ever-growing concerns of mental health diseases, these are just two examples of the many treatments which Edelman has seen grow successfully.

Or finally it could be due to their Gleedelman performance! For some, maybe this is the case, but personally, work which is challenging, stimulating and potentially life changing – who wouldn’t want to be a part of that!

Find out more at http://www.edelman.co.uk/what-we-do/health-and-medical-education and http://maryfizzy.blogspot.com/