Language Ladies & Digital Dudes

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Yesterday I discussed some of the trends I’ve noticed with the employment process in general but there are a few fascinating trends intersecting now that will affect the communications sector.

The first is the domination of women in "language" professions: Men are becoming increasingly scarce in journalism, more and more woman are becoming lawyers (the number of women in legal jobs doubled from 1982-2004); three-quarters of our nation’s teachers are women, and women dominate the public relations profession.

An April 25, 2001, USA Today article entitled "Women Dominate PR…Is That Good?" cites the amount of women in PR at seventy percent.That comes as little surprise for those of us in public relations.

That women own the PR profession is unremarkable in and of itself. But add a few more trends to the mix, and things start to get interesting.

It’s hardly surprising that men dominate the science and technology professions be even so, many of the women who are in those jobs are leaving them. Many of the technology jobs that men dominate, are, of course, Web-centric.

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Draws Global Industry Chiefs
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Yeah, so?

Two seemingly unrelated and ho-hum trends, right? Well, let’s throw in a third trend: The massive shift of marketing and advertising dollars from print and broadcast to the Internet.

PR pros know that they need to master online communications if they are to survive. But in order to master online communications, you must understand it. And in order to fully understand it, you need to grasp
how the technology through which we communicate online works.

The end result, then, is that some of the hottest jobs in the public relations industry will be for people like…yours truly.

People who understand the technical aspects of Internet technologies, who understand how ordinary people use these technologies to communicate, and who have superb communication skills, both online and offline, will be able to fill a growing demand in the PR world.

And that demand may very well put some more testosterone in the halls of public relations agencies across the nation.