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Two common documents used by management teams in community relations programs aimed at promotion of service quality are news releases (press releases) and pitch letters. News releases make announcements about the organization; whereas, pitch letters seek media coverage for activities of the organization. Another important function in management teams’ public relations efforts is the preparation of corporate annual reports. Also, the advertising activities of an organization contribute greatly to the community image of that organization. Management teams must be aware that news releases, pitch letters, corporate annual reports, and advertisements are vital to their organization’s community image and to the promotion of service quality. This article presents a detailed, “how‐to” examination of these aspects of media relations as tools for management teams in achieving service quality.

Examines ethics in the health care industry from the perspectives of investors, employees, patients, competitors and the environment. Ethical behaviour in the health care industry is essential and desirable; however, determining which behavioural actions are ethical and which are unethical is difficult. Although never will everyone agree on specific ethical standards, everyone should agree that setting ethical standards is vital. Therefore, administrators of health care institutions and health care providers should work together to establish codes of ethics which define boundaries for ethical behaviours in the health care industry.

Notes that most business messages can be strategically categorized as either good news messages, bad news messages, or persuasive messages and that from perspectives of receivers of business messages, these messages are viewed as being either something they are pleased to hear (good news), something they are not pleased to hear (bad news), or something urging them to perform some action (persuasive). Points out that, since most business messages fall into three general categories, basic approaches have been developed for preparing each of these categories of messages, suggesting these approaches should be followed by business executives so that their messages will be as effective as possible. Presents and discusses these three basic approaches to effective business messages.

Almost everyone agrees that human resources will play a key role in company success in the next century, but too few firms take a systematic approach to human resource planning. Barron Wells and Nelda Spinks, of the University of South‐Western Louisiana, USA, provide a 15‐step checklist for a comprehensive human resource program.

Managers spend much time in counselling employees. Examines this process, which demands careful use of a manager’s performance counselling, namely, disciplinary counselling, grievance counselling and performance appraisal counselling.

A set of five competences characterizing successful leaders was identified through research by Warren Bennis in the 1980s. Reports a survey asking college of business students and their professors how they ranked the importance of these competences. There was no significant difference between students′ and professors′ rankings.

Developing and implementing a successful community image program is an organizational communication activity of utmost importance. No organization survives for long in a community in which it has a poor image. Usually, the community supplies the workforce, houses that workforce, supplies customers and clients, makes many laws that affect the organization, and sets much of the tax structure that pertain to an organization. This article takes a detailed look at the five components of establishing a successful community image program.

Notes that today, most large‐ and medium‐size businesses conduct operations globally. Communication crossing national boundaries ‐ international communication ‐ is not necessarily different from any other communication activity. However, intercultural communication, that is, communication activities among people of different cultures, is different. Discusses many cultural factors and language differences in global communication, as well as precedence and improvement in global communication.

Most organizations today want to portray an image of integrity and ethical behaviour. To accomplish this, many organizations develop social responsibility programmes and codes of ethics. Such programmes and codes let employees in the organization know that company leadership is committed to ethical behaviours, and these programmes and codes define what behaviours are considered ethical and unethical. The code of ethics, as well as upper‐level management’s support of the code, must be communicated clearly to all persons in the organization. The role of each person in implementing and following the code must be communicated as well. The code also must be communicated in ways that will elicit the support of everyone in the organization.

Gaining suitable employment is a major concern of job seekers. Times change and preferences of Human Resources Officers (HROs) in relation to résumés and job application letters change with the times. What trends have developed over the past 20 years that may give clues to present and future preferences of HROs for content of résumés and application letters that they receive? Authors of this paper have conducted three surveys of large companies (The Fortune 500 Corporations) at evenly spaced intervals over the past 20 years. These surveys reveal trends and preferences of HROs of large businesses concerning content they expect in résumés and job application letters. This paper presents these preferences and trends.