Public relations in Estonia nowadays
by Tuomas Muhonen

In this blog post I try to answer to next question: Are there any signs of two-way symmetrical communication in Estonian organisations? Firstly I have to remind that there are not studies of the overall situation nowadays. Anyway I found some material related to the subject.

Responsible Business Forum in Estonia (Vastutustundliku Ettevõtluse Foorum) has studied practices related to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in small and medium enterprises (SME) in Estonia. CSR can be seen as a sign of open organization and two-way symmetrical communication because its purpose is somehow dialogic and mutual understanding. According to Responsible Business Forum in Estonia (2007: 29) about 35 % of respondents claim they have been implementing some CSR activity. The most important interest groups for SMEs were shareholders and clients. Here is the short summary of CSR in Estonian Companies.

Subsequently, I tried to find out in which level PR-practioners work in organisations. Managers see public relations mainly as a technical function (Jänes 2005: 122). Main service area is media relations while other areas are quite small (Soone 2007: 2).

The biggest trend in governmental level are online information services. Use of information technology is also a very developed field in Estonia. Anyway, problem is how to use this new technology progressively. (Anton & Rannu 2005: 100.) Use of information technology has a lot of possibilities on the way to open society and organizations.

According to the source material, Estonia has not reached the stage of open society. Organizations have not really understood how they could use public relations to build mutual understanding with stakeholders. However, there are small signs of dialog in Estonian organizations.

USED SOURCES:

Responsible Business Forum in Estonia (2007). CSR in Estonian SMEs.

Anton, R & Rannu, R (2005). Eesti Vabariigi valitsuse suhtekorralduse areng taasiseseisvumise järel. In Praktiline suhtekorraldus: Eesti kogemus. Tartu Ûlikooli Kirjastus.

Jänes, K (2005). Juhtide arvamus suhtekorraldusest: Juht hindab suhtekorraldust, kuid mitte suhtekorraldajat. In Praktiline suhtekorraldus: Eesti kogemus. Tartu Ûlikooli Kirjastus.

Soone, I (2007). Estonian PR Market Overview.