The formative years of public relations in Singapore started under its colonial rule, and public relations practitioners were chiefly branded as "propagandists", as much of the public relations activities consisted of renewing the countries citizens' faith after the fall of British control to the Japanese Imperial Army in World War II (Beng, 1994, p. 373-374). After the independence of Singapore in 1965, governmental public relations endeavors were mainly one-way communication (Beng, 1994, p. 374) in the form of a public information model (Grunig, Hunt, 1984). However, as the leadership shifted to then Prime Minister, Goh Chok Tong in, the government progressed to be more sensitive to the interests of its people and the global market (Beng, 1994, p.374). A comment by then Minister of Information and the Arts, George Yeo, which governmental public relations work falls under, reiterated this stance that "governmental polices needed to be marketed rather than sold to the Singapore public today" (Beng, 1994, p. 375). Currently, predominantly six forms of relations in which public relations practitioners operate in Singapore can be identified; they are media relations, customer relations, employee relations, community relations, financial relations, and governmental relations (Chow et al, 1996, p. 266).
Public relations practitioners are often viewed upon as a spokesperson of an organisation, often associated with organising events, handling press relations, production of promotional films and corporate publications (Chow et al, 1996, p. 270; Beng, 1994, p. 390-391). Linda Chee, Senior Vice President and Head of Group Communications of Ascendas, noted that "good media relations makes my job easier"(Dortok, 2006, p. 325). When questioned about the credibility with media, Chee commented that credibility is the key to maintaining the organisation's reputation. This process involves being transparent, accessible and responsive to the media at any time, so that mutual trust and a high comfort level can be built with the media, thus, ensuring balanced reporting by the media (Lim, Goh, Sriramesh, 2005; Dortok, 2006).
Customers have always been the driving force of corporations as they are the source of their revenue, determining the profit margin. Therefore, it is not surprising for organisations to have their public relations departments to focus their efforts on the consumers, as they will always be an "important stakeholder" (Chow et al, 1996, p. 274). Organisations have come to the realisation that part of customer relationship management is to handle complaints when customers experience poor customer service. A study done by Lim, Goh, Sriramesh (2005), concluded that Singaporeans are normally passive, forbearing and non-confrontational. Therefore, instead of engaging the organisation when they experienced poor service, they express their discontentment to their friends and relatives (Lim et al, 2005). This revealed the passive-aggressive nature of Singaporeans, and companies should develop a proactive corporate philosophy, which centres on the customers (Lim et al, 2005).
Most corporations place heavy emphasis on externalities such as marketing, branding and image management, and lesser attention on internal communications (Chong, 2007, p. 201). What is worse than customers speaking ill of an organisation, is when the employees are critical or even badmouthing the organisation. Therefore, it is crucial to pay more attention to employees as they are considered one of the "most trusted information sources about an organisation" (Chong, 2007, p. 201). One of the ways to have a quantitative and qualitative understanding of ground level staffs is to conduct in-house surveys. Furthermore, Dortok (2006) warned employers that when the organisation undertakes surveys with the incorrect methods, such as a flawed design and the absence of obvious change, employees will doubt the organisation's intention when change "finally" comes.
Through the correct application of research, public relation becomes a fundamental component to the organisation. The public relations practice enables an insight into stakeholder sentiments. The Singapore government provides one of the best examples of utilising public relations in a crisis. Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) was one of the worse epidemics experienced in Singapore. Upon the discovery of the SARS outbreak in February 2003, the foreign media was wary of the response by Singapore, the "authoritarian state", as many Northeast Asian states have chosen the path of cover-ups, depriving people of the right to know (Menon, Goh, 2005, p. 375). Therefore, in response to this epidemic, "Singapore okay", a public relations effort to reestablish public confidence was set in motion (Menon, Goh, 2005, p. 382).
The responsibilities of public relations practitioners in the arena of finance, largely surrounds the stakeholders. The public relations department would generate items such as annual general reports and financial reports, with inputs from other departments, to update its publics (Dortok, 2006). Therefore, when stakeholders or even media, raise concerns over issues which might affect the public confidence, public relations practitioners are obligated to not just "pacify" the uncertainty, but to reaffirm the stakeholders regarding their investments (Dortok, 2006).
There are many factors that could affect the practices of public relations, and a very crucial one is the government. Proper management of governmental relations not only benefits the organisation, as they better understand the leadership, but also for the local authority to get to know these organisations, which is one way to earn trust from the government. A role of public relations practitioners seldom seen in Singapore is lobbying. As defined by Arnold lobbying is the attempt "To try to influence the thinking of legislators or other public officials for or against a specific cause". The closest encounter, which we have witnessed at such a large scale, was when Singapore loosened its regulations to allow "two 'integrated resort with casino' (IR) licenses", and bidders teamed up to strategise their communications campaigns that focuses on its key public" (Arnold, 2006).
Singapore is a multiracial, multicultural and multi-religious society, and an economy that practices capitalism. Despite the wide variety of languages, and the pressure to adopt Malay as its official language due to its geological position, Singapore government chose English as its official language in 1956 as mentioned by Dortok (2006). This language policy propelled Singapore forward as the linguistic barrier between different ethnic groups was overcome, thereby uniting Singaporeans with one language, and launching Singapore in the globalisation arena.
The world presently can be depicted as experiencing an age where many transnational demarcations are torn down, through free trade agreements and widespread use of information technology (Lim et al., 2005, p. 316). As the world strides forward, towards globalisation, international public relations needs to grow in significance, because public relations is required to positively bridge relationships between the multinational corporations and its stakeholders, as mentioned by Botan, 1992 (Tan, Soh, 1994). By adapting the "Political, Economic, Social and Technological" (PEST) analysis, a modification of it will focus on challenges which pertain to politics, economy and culture of the public relations practice in Singapore.
Despite having a fully elected government, Singapore does not subscribe to liberal democracy, but more of social democracy, where national interests come before self-interests. The absence of pluralism in its political scene only strengthens the domination of the ruling party. Unlike most Western countries, where liberal democracy is practiced, and freedom of speech is constitutionalised, there are a lot of regulations, both legal and self-imposed, in Singapore (Beng, 1994). Thus, media is not recognised as the fourth estate or watchdog of the government in Singapore. However, media is often working together with the government, pushing through national interests (Beng, 1994). Hence, public relations practitioners and the organisation's stakeholders recognise that the press is almost like an "extension" of the government, instead of being "independent" from it. This is of concern, as it means that public relations is in some way subservient to the power of the press. In addition, with the oligopolistic trait of the media industry in Singapore, the almost-nonexistence status of alternative media ensures that public relations practitioners have to be extra cautious, so as not to "strain" the relationship with the major press (Beng, 1994, p. 377).
Although there are a high number of businesses in Western countries, such as Australia, that recognise the value of public relations, and acknowledge it as a strategic management tool, most senior managements in Singapore have not come to appreciate the benefits yet (Chow et al, 1996, p. 260, 274). A history of unwholesome competition between public relations organisations has resulted in the wide disparity on fees charged, and this feud has painted a vile and sinister picture of the public relations industry (Beng, 1994, p. 376). The poor perception of the public relations industry in Singapore is also partly due to the lack of understanding of the professional works undertaken by public relations practitioners, as there is insufficient research of public relations in local context (Chow et al, 1996; Sriramesh, Monghan, Lim, 2007). This deficit in acknowledgement is rooted in ""the quick-gratification" media mindset or the desire for quick results such as higher sales immediately after a media event prevails in the Singapore market place" (Beng, 1994, p. 390). As such, the senior managements of local organisations are usually not "patient" enough to wait around for the benefits of public relations practices to eventuate. Only when organisations begin to grasp the reality that the image and reputation of the brand name is also a product, they will continue to view public relations practices merely as mediocrities.
Bearing the history of public relations being branded as a "propagandist" practice (Beng, 1994, p. 373-374), Chee argues that when public relations practitioners go over the top and "over-sell" their message, the negative connotations linking ethical public relations practices with Nazi-like propaganda will turn people into cynics (Dortok, 2006). Despite the growth in the pedagogy of public relations, these ethnocentric studies are largely limited within the boundaries of Western countries (Sriramesh, 2004, p. 1). Smith emphasised the issue of intercultural communication (1966) in the statement that suggested "communication and culture are inseparable" (Zarharna, 2000, p. 85). Therefore, one of the biggest challenges culturally in Singapore is the temptation to implement the Western principles, executing them without "further research and adaptations" (Chow et al, 1996, p. 260).
Organisations in Singapore must start to realise that their employees are an important stakeholder that cannot be ignored. Negligence is detrimental as it would be wasting precious time and hampering workforce morale (Tan, Soh, 1994). The success story of Singapore Airlines has proven that it is able to constantly deliver excellence because of the inculcation of its core values within its staffs, that they become "'walking' and 'living' embodiments of the corporate brand", exhibiting "brand-supporting behaviors" (Chong, 2007, p. 204, 210). Public relations practitioners in Singapore must maintain its professionalism by creating healthy competition in its industry, and not set fees ridiculously. The consistency in fees charged will render confidence from the public (Beng, 1994, p. 376). Prevention is always better than cure; senior management should involve public relations practitioners in top management level planning, so that they are able to draft communications plans, moving on from the press-agentry model to "strategic planning" (Grunig, Hunt, 1984; Beng, 1994, p. 391-393). This will remove the "fire-engine" mentality, launching public relations from a technician role to a managerial role (Beng, 1994, p. 377, 391-393).
