Is It Time to Give up on Kobe and Derrick?

If you're a Bulls' or Lakers' fan, it might be time to face reality....The reality that your superstars might need to give it up. 

Kobe Bryant had been in the league since he got out of high school, he's currently 37 years old, and has missed quite a number of games in the last few years due to injury. Bryant is old, but to those who are true fans of his know that he is similar to Jordan in that anything less than a championship is failure. And if you pay attention to basketball you'll know that the Lakers have missed the playoffs for the last few years. Another issue is that Kobe is not allowing room for other superstars to thrive on the Lakers because he is hard to work with and/or makes it hard for the front office to pay them because of his contract. Which in turn makes it difficult for the team to grow and get back to winning. 

As far as Derrick Rose, he's INJURY PRONE. It just came out that he has  a left orbital fracture and will be out for an estimated two weeks. I personally can't even remember the last time he finished a season, but if I was in the Bulls front office I would be thinking of a way to get out his contract. That thinking would then lead me to start looking into future draft picks, free agents, and possible trades to replace him. Yes, Rose has a lot of talent but that talent is a waste if he can't be used. 

Breakdown of Rose's injuries: 
  4/30/2012: ACL Tear 
     -First regular season game 10/29/2013 
  11/22/2013: Medial Meniscus tear in Right Knee
      -A little less than a month after first regular season game 
  2/24/2015: Re-tears Medial Meniscus
      -5/8/2015: Hits game winning shot in Eastern Conference Semifinal Game 3
  9/30/2015: Surgery to repair left orbital fracture
    -He's getting paid 41.4 million through 2017

Information from: http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=13786765


My biggest concern from that timeline is the time in between the meniscus and hitting that game winning shot, but of course I'm not a doctor or have any medical knowledge. All I know is I hope he did give it a chance to rest and will give it time to rest while he's healing from his most recent injury. But, hopefully for Bulls fans they will get to see their superstar play a whole season.     

If you'd like to hear actual analysts talk about Rose's most recent injury Stephen A. Smith and Skip Bayless spoke about it today on First Take and will most likely be on Sports Center for the next few days. But, that's all I have for now before the NBA pre-season starts.

Let Me Introduce Myself... Well Re-Introduce Myself

Well I guess Aggie was right, I didn't blog after her class since I was no longer required to do it. But, I got to thinking that I never posted anything truly about myself in any of my previous posts.


I've finally graduated from Ohio Northern University after 4 years! I spent my time in Ada studying Public Relations and Sports Management. And most people have asked me, why not go to a big/more well known school for those fields... Before I gave a very generic answer and now I can give a much stronger answer. I chose ONU because the teachers don't just tell you they care about you, they actually show you that they care. Here's a perfect example: I went back for a week to spend some time with my boyfriend; while he was in class today, I spent some time with my Public Relations advisor. We talked about what avenues I should be thinking about jobs, how her son was doing, and general catch up type of things. I don't think I would've gotten that at a bigger school.


Outside of school, I'm just a girl from Indy (Indianapolis, In). I love the sports atmosphere and being able to jump the border to Chicago to catch the Cubbies every now and again during the summertime.  Also, take the time in Chicago and downtown Indy to spend some time at different festivals and concerts with friends or my family. When those activities subside when the fall comes around I'm usually in Ada cheering on my favorite Polar Bear, my boyfriend, at football games or yelling for the Colts on Sundays with my family. Otherwise, I'm curled up with my puppy and reading or catching up my favorite tv shows.

I think that's it for right now, but stay on the lookout for job updates.

Sticking to My New Year's Resolution

It's crazy to think that March is already winding down, but something less so is that most people have fallen out of their commitments to their resolutions. However, I think I got that backwards because at the beginning of the year I was really lazy in my resolution of working out more consistently, but these last two months my boyfriend has helped me that a lot. He's been working out with me and giving me workouts to do while he's busy working doing other stuff. I must say though I am liking my results so far.

We even came up with a "rewards program" as motivation this past week. Most of you know Girl Scouts are selling and dropping off cookies around this time and I am a huge tagalongs fan! That's how the rewards program happened and for every workout I complete without being lazy or complaining I get a cookie. Now, it may sound childish but it's one way to help me get my butt up and go to the gym. Otherwise,  I would be the girl sitting in her dorm room, eating the whole box of cookies as I watch all the bride shows on TLC.

My other motivation is that I have a big internship this summer and since my goal after graduation is to potentially work for this school and work in sports it would be nice to look the part. In my mind, a person working in the world of sport needs to be fit and looking their best. That's the ultimate goal at the end of the day.

It's also a good break from the stress of classes and other obligations because this semester has been really busy. Working out gives me a chance to clear my head and gives me a real reason to take a nap during the day. But, the stress of school stuff and working out has made the verse i want for my 1st tattoo seem more and more true everyday!

Verse: I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me ---- Philippians 4:13

Jameis Winston: Close Call

Jameis Winston is the current quarterback for the football at Florida State University and is a Heisman Trophy favorite this year. While all that is good to hear the young quarterback was accused of raping a female student and had faced felony charges after the accusations being made almost a year ago. 

Initially, the accuser told campus police on the night of the incident, but since it was an off campus incident, it was immediately taken to the Tallahassee police. During the process, the victim's attorneys were critical of them and in turn caused the police to be defensive. In their defense they presented the following timeline:

January 10th- Winston was identified as the alleged attacker (incident happened on 12/7/12)

January 15th- Rape kit was sent to the state crime lab

January 23rd- Winston denied to be interviewed by police

NOTE: The dates are given from last year/early this year

This past February the case was put in an "open/inactive" status because the victim didn't wish to prosecute. However, her attorney denied that she wanted to drop the case. Today, it was announced that the state attorney will not be pressing charges against Winston. However, over the last few weeks the state attorney took a look into the case and interviewed the accuser and a month ago it was reported by ESPN.com that the DNA found in the accuser's underwear was Winston's DNA which  is where the disagreement on whether it was consensual or rape. 

Keeping all that in mind the state attorney decided today (12/5) that Winston would not be charged. If Winston had been charged with a felony by the state, he would of been suspended from the football team immediately and ineligible under the FSU athletics Department policy. 

Winston and the Seminoles need to beat Duke on Saturday for the ACC championship and to get to the BCS National Championship at Rose Bowl Stadium on January 6th. We will find out sometime next week if he will be our next Heisman Trophy winner. 

Jameis Winston not charged (Article Courtesy of ESPN.com)

Taking a look at Non-Profits

Katie Paine and any good PR practitioner could tell you that relationships are key in any organization, but especially in non-profits. Non-profits rely heavily on people volunteering and willing to donate.

Measuring how these relationships can impact a non-profit is important and Katie gives 3 reasons for the importance.

1. Social Media: Social media has brought out new ways to reach community stakeholders and not measuring will provide no judgement on which will be most effective. There are also a number of easy no-cost or low-cost tools to create communities in order to stay in touch with stakeholders. 

    Example: Prom Genie, an Indianapolis based non-profit, uses its 

    Facebook page to tell people about it's events, where donations 

   can be made and how they can be made, and how to apply for 

   scholarships. 

2. Metrics: Recently, non-profits have to act like for-profits because of the recent financial difficulties when it comes to measuring. Non-profits are keep those difficulties in mind by adding board members in from the for-profit sector.

      Example: Prom Genie  brought in someone with a background in compliance, business

     development, and management that has worked with big name companies like Wells Fargo and 

     Wellpoint. 

3. Accountability: In turn, donors and contributors are increasingly demanding on what their gifts are being used for by the organizations. 

      Example: Prom Genie provides high school junior and senior girls with prom dresses and 

      accessories. They also provide three seniors with scholarships every year, which makes having 

      financial donations very important. However, getting the motto, "It's more than just a dress", across 

      to donors is very hard because of the name. Board members have to be detailed in telling donors 

      that they provide scholarships and are also looking into having a college fair this year. 

Prom Genie Website

Prom Genie on Facebook

Turkey Day: The Break Was Needed

As the semester ends papers, projects, presentations and other things seem to pile up. In midst of all that the week off for Thanksgiving was needed to catch up on sleep, assignments, and family time. 

This year even though I had a good amount of homework to do, it was really important to me that I got to see my family. I think the importance of family was made even stronger this year because of the crazy summer my family in losing people close to us back to back. But, I also think it brought both my extended and immediate family closer which was needed.

My extended family came over to my house on Thursday night around four and all the women warmed up the food and set it up in a buffet style to make it easier to move everyone out the kitchen. Before we ate dinner we all gathered to say what we were thankful for, the underlying theme was love, and my dad ended with a prayer. Then we all ate our weight in food while watching football then the fun began. After dinner there was a little bit of everything going on like: playing cards, watching TV, the younger kids were running around, and some people ended up helping me take my braids down. 

This year was different because I got to bring my boyfriend with me for my (extended/mom's) family to meet. I think two of my cousins, both male and older, didn't seemed to like the idea of a boyfriend. One of them didn't realize I was 21 when he asked my mom was I even allowed to date, which was really funny. Outside of introducing my boyfriend to everyone, the most eventful event of the night was having my cousins and mom help me take down my braids. My mom cut them while my cousins and I took them out. It was definitely a long process. 

But, the way the night ended was the best. I got a chance to spend it with my cousins, Savanna ("Vanna") and Davonte ("DJ"). The three of us were raised like siblings because we were born so close together. We slowly allowed our significant others into our group and include them in our hang out time. The three of us always decide to do something during the times our family gets together so we can just do 20-something stuff. This year we stayed up late after dinner to talk and watch movies. 

Food for thought: You can't ever take the moments you have with those you love for granted because they can become memories quickly

Threats to Your Reputation

What makes up a company's reputation?  Paine describes it as the relationships that a company has with its public(s). It's what people think of when they here about the brand, it determines if people will buy or recommend the products or services offered, if they'd want work or invest in/for the company.

The trust, commitment and satisfaction that companies try to build takes awhile to build up, but can be lost in seconds. Grunig, Grunig, and Dozier came up with four principles to help in a crisis situation.

1) The Relationship Principle says that the company can go through it issues and crises easier if it has established good, long-term relationships with its target audiences who are at risk from the company's behaviors.

2) The Accountability Principle says a company needs to accept responsibility at the time of the problem even if was not their fault.

3) The Disclosure Principle says that during a crisis the company must give all the information it has and promise to give the information it doesn't have soon after they receive it.

4) The Symmetrical Communication Principle says that at the time of a crisis the company needs to think about the publics interest to be just as important as its own, meaning that the company should have a conversation with publics and to practice CRS when in crisis.

A company that failed at keeping up their reputation was Dell in a crisis called Dell Hell. A blogger wrote about a problem he had been having and a large group of other customers commented with similar stories. The consequences were that the story spread through social media then moved to mainstream media and their stock price dropped. Dell went through many years of listening to customers, apologizing and working to fix their computers to restore its reputation. It took a number of hefty discounts for people to come back to the company.