Exploring the effectiveness of public relations practices in the public sector: a Namibian case study

Abstract

Public relations remains a profession that is admired in most Sub-African countries including Namibia. According to Grunig (2008, p. 4), public relations and communication management denote a process of planning, executing and evaluating the organisation’s communication with both internal (employees, directors, and board members) and external (media, teachers, customers, unionists, and community members) publics. This study covered the effectiveness of public relations practices in the Namibian government ministries which include communication practices and management. The theoretical framework of this study is based on PR activities, tools and parameters of the Excellence Theory that depict the value of PR in the public sector. The study targeted over 40 public relations officers in 24 government ministries in Namibia. Questionnaires were distributed to public relations officers and media officers in the ministries. The random sampling method was used to select the participants in this study. The researcher aimed for rich data, therefore, official documents such as annual reports on the activities of PROs in the government, ministerial communication strategy, Government Communication plan, Social Media Policy and other relevant documents were used. The qualitative method remained a predominately research method of this study. Based on the selected qualitative research method, data were interpreted and analysed considering the objective of the research. The chosen data analysis for this study was descriptive analysis.