80% of Companies in Georgia Have Women PRs

The FINANCIAL — According to research carried out by The FINANCIAL women manage the Public Relations departments at 80% of companies in Georgia.

Moreover, out of the 630 investigated companies in Georgia only 40% of them actually had a position under the name of PR. In such cases the companies either have no persons responsible for public relations or such duties are attached to the company director or marketing manager.

Ipqli is one of Georgia’s biggest wheat and bread production companies. But it has no position of PR. Customers’ calls are therefore usually answered by the accountant or secretaries. Many managers still believe that PR is not even necessary to run a successful business. Sometimes it’s better to be invisible to the media or community. Such perceptions are widely popular especially among ex-soviet businessmen.

The FINANCIAL’s research was carried out among 630 small, middle sized and large companies based in Georgia. There are unnoticeable differences between the figures of female PR representatives in different spheres.

According to the research the highest presence of women PRs was in the non-governmental sector (90%), followed by the commercial service sector (89%), capital goods sector (88%), international and local business companies (87%), healthcare sector (86%), consumer service (85%), financial sector (83%), consumer staples sector (79%), telecommunication sector (75%), energy sector (73%), consumer discretionary sector (63%), and transportation sector (60%).

The chance of becoming a PR professional in Georgia is higher for women than it is for men.

However, the figures of female PR presence are quite different in comparison to female CEOs in Georgia.

According to the research about women CEOs conducted by The FINANCIAL three weeks ago, women CEO presence was highest in the health care sector (37%), followed by the consumer service sector (23%), non-governmental and consumer discretionary sector (17%), transportation and consumer staples sector (16%), commercial services (14%), international and local businesses (10%), capital goods sector (8%), financial and energy sector (6%), and telecommunication sector (0%).

The FINANCIAL investigated why there is such a high presence of women PRs in Georgia and what the main factors are that are considered when choosing women PRs.

“It is a very interesting and unusual practice that most of the PR professionals in Georgia are female. To my mind, there are several factors why most of the companies in Georgia choose women to be PR executives.

The first thing is that most of the PR professionals in Georgia are ex-journalists and as we can see the majority of journalists in Georgia are female.

I would assume that this is also a pattern in the education system. During and after the period of the Soviet Union professions where somehow divided into ‘female’ and ‘male’ occupations.

A career in journalism was considered more for women than men, and the same thing happened to public relations,” says Teona Bagdavadze, Course Director at the London School of Public Relations and Branding, Tbilisi Office.

“The majority of companies in Georgia hire women as their PR managers because the vast majority of the graduates with degrees in PR are women, so the choice is limited to that gender.

Therefore, the question should instead be why do women choose PR as a profession more than men.

One of the reasons may be that in Georgia we have professions that are considered more female and those that are considered more male. For the very same reason the majority of teachers, translators etc. are women, and the majority of mathematicians or economists, for instance, are men,” says Natalia Tvaltchrelidze, PR Manager at the Georgian Institute of Public Affairs.

According to Bagdavadze, at the London School of PR and Branding, Tbilisi Office, they have 15% male and 85% female students, while in another 18 countries, the proportion is approximately 30% – male, 70% – female, or even 50% – male, 50% – female.

 “The majority of students on the MA course in Public Relations at GIPA, for instance, are female,” says Tvaltchrelidze.

According to GIPA, out of 46 students in the first and second course only 2 are boys, which equal only 4%.

“According to the research conducted by the USA Institute of Public Relations, male PR professionals get 20-25% higher salaries than women do.

This is explained by two main factors, one is that male professionals mainly work in more well-paid fields like: the Heavy industry, Pharmacy sector, Political PR and so on, and the other factor is  that women are more dedicated to their families and distribute their time mainly between family and work,” says Bagdavadze.

“When choosing PRs, regardless of their gender, companies consider the combination of education, work experience and appearance.”

“Education and work experience would come first (again, there are incomparably more women who have received their formal education in PR or related fields).”

“However, appearance and pleasant personality along with good presentation skills would also count as a PR Manager is normally the face that the company should be associated with in the eyes of the public,” says Tvaltchrelidze.

Bagdavadze says that the candidate’s appearance is an important factor in the selection process not only in Georgia but all around the world.

“We receive 80% of information in a non-verbal form (gesture, smile, and look) and only 20% from the verbal form. So attractive people (no matter whether male or female) have a higher chance of getting hired for the position of company PR.

Work experience and good contact with the media are also considered important factors by employers in Georgia for their PR staff.

The situation changed when some professional western experienced training bodies like the London School of PR and Branding entered the Georgian market.

Most of our students are already experienced in the field, and have an understanding that every PR activity that is made should not be done without previous research and that the objectives have to be SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Tangible),” says Bagdavadze.

At LSPR 85% of students doing PR courses are women and at GIPA – 94% are women.