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A Tight Job Market in PR

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By Jennifer Jacobson

If you want a job in public relations at a college or university, now may be the wrong time to go looking for one.

Tight budgets have forced many institutions to cut back the size of their media-relations staffs. And those offices that are hiring have received more applications than usual, including some from PR executives who have lost jobs in the private sector and view academe as a more stable, albeit lower-paying, employer.

"We're seeing an increasing number of applicants for the very few job openings we've had," says Alan K. Cubbage, vice president for university relations at Northwestern University. When his office advertised an opening two months ago for an associate-editor position at the university's alumni magazine, roughly 100 people applied, he says, far more than the 30 applicants for a similar position almost four years ago.

In the last year and a half, Virginia Tech has laid off five of its 56 public-relations employees, and the University of Arizona's public-relations office is half the size it was in the 1980s. Meanwhile, the PR office at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst is down to a news director and an editor.

During last year's state budget cuts, "Virginia got whacked in higher education," says Lawrence G. Hincker, Virginia Tech's associate vice president for public relations. A cut of $130,000 in his department's roughly $3-million budget forced him to lay off a public-relations manager in the university's Northern Virginia office, a graphic designer, two writers, and a radio programmer.

Virginia Tech's finances this year, however, look stable, says Mr. Hincker, who now has 51 people reporting to him. Two months ago, he hired a director of news and information, and close to 50 people applied for the position, "a little bit more than normal," he says. The last time he filled a directorship, more than five years ago, 35 to 40 people applied. His office is now searching for a news-bureau manager, for which he expects to receive around 30 applications.

Despite the cuts in Mr. Hincker's department, however, Virginia Tech has hired public-relations staff for other parts of the university. For example, at the same time that he had to lay off five of his employees, the development office was allowed to hire three PR staff members, or what Mr. Hincker refers to as "communicators."

John H. Lippincott, vice president for communications at the Council for Advancement and Support of Education, says the "economic climate and state budget cuts are putting pressure on administrative offices, including PR offices."

Still, he says, "universities have in recent years put more and more resources into marketing, and into hiring marketing people."

"You would think in the aftermath of the baby boomlet moving through universities that they would need to market less because the demand is high and the supply is low," he says. "The competition, nevertheless, remains very intense for the high-ability students."

So despite the slow economy, some institutions are continuing to expand their PR offices and finding it a buyer's market.

The PR office at Michigan State University hired a media-communications director who starts this month, and nearly 130 people applied for the position, says Terry Denbow, vice president for university relations. A similar position that was vacant three years ago drew roughly half the number, he says. Mr. Denbow also recently hired a public-relations staff member for the university's College of Social Sciences, and 138 people applied. His office is now searching for a PR officer for the university's medical school.

While his department has been allowed to conduct a half a dozen PR searches in the past year, money is still tight at the university, as it is at most public institutions. Over the last three years, Mr. Denbow says, his office has had to eliminate about 12 full-time positions because of state budget cuts, and has been forced to keep four positions open indefinitely.

Anthony T. Hoppa, associate vice chancellor for university relations at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, has no openings is his 10-member office. He was recently able to hire a graphic designer and an art director, but is not certain when he will be able to hire again.

Mr. Hoppa, who receives four or five unsolicited phone calls a month from job candidates looking for work in his office, says he feels "fortunate" to have been able to hire at all this year. "We have an incredibly supportive vice chancellor for university relations, and he understands ... that if we can communicate more about the university, ultimately that will help the university."

Mr. Hoppa, however, has sought to cut costs. His staff has trimmed the university magazine from four issues a year down to three. An internal employee newsletter that used to be produced in print is now available only on the Web.

It's been four years since the University of Arizona last hired someone in public relations, says Sharon L. Kha, associate vice president for university communications. And if any of her eight employees were to leave now, it's unlikely that she would be able to replace them.

"We've been in a downsizing mode," Ms. Kha says of the entire university. She has seen her staff reduced from 16 people 20 years ago down to 8 today. "It's been difficult. We have not been able to hire people or replace people if they go elsewhere or retire. We've just had to shift the workload. Each person picks up more things that would have been done by other people."

Although she is not sure when she will be able to hire again, she would like to add a couple of Web-savvy writers to the three or four people who do the bulk of the writing now.

Barbara A. Pitoniak, news director at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, has only two people on her staff, herself and an editor. Before budget cuts hit the university four years ago, the public-relations office consisted of an assistant vice chancellor for communications and marketing, a news director, an assistant news director, and four staff editors.

After her science writer left this spring, Ms. Pitoniak got the OK to search for a new one this summer. About 50 people had applied when the university administration told her that because of budget cuts, she needed to cancel the search.

"This job has been extremely hard," she says. The news director ends up being the single spokesman for the campus, "and having only one other staff person really limits our ability to do proactive news about the university."

When her office had four staff members, she says, they really covered the university, dividing it up into beats and meeting with department heads and administrators to find out what was happening on the campus.

"Basically, we're down to answering the phone and working with what people bring us, rather than going out and finding it," she says. "The kind of news people bring you is not the kind of news that will get national placements" in newspapers. "Faculty don't think in those terms. They think presenting a paper at a conference three months ago is news, rather than the groundbreaking work they're doing that will make a good story in The New York Times."

As strapped as the university is for cash, the public-relations office will be hiring a news director in December. That's when Ms. Pitoniak, who has grown weary of her job, leaves.