International award for University’s PR professor
Wed, 26 Aug 2015 06:00:00 BST
Professor Anne Gregory will receive the Institute of Public Relations 2015 Pathfinder Award
WORLD-renowned expert in the field of public relations, Professor Anne Gregory, is to receive the highest academic honour that can be bestowed by the Institute of Public Relations (IPR), the 2015 Pathfinder Award.
The award is conferred in recognition of an original programme of scholarly research that has made a significant contribution to the body of knowledge and practice of public relations.
Earlier this year, Professor Gregory was recognised for her key role in developing the standing of her profession in the UK, when she received an Honorary Fellowship from the Chartered Institute of Public Relations in London. Professor Gregory was already a holder of CIPR’s Sir Steven Tallents Medal – named after a founding father of the PR profession in the UK – and is one of only six people who have ever received both distinctions.
A former President of the CIPR and the immediate Past Chair of Global Alliance, Professor Gregory will present her latest award-winning research on corporate communications at the Fourth Annual IPR Research Symposium at the Yale Club on November 17 in New York City.
The symposium will feature a panel of speakers reviewing progress in the field and research-based insights on priority topics identified by IPR Trustees as important to the practice. Professor Gregory will be presented with the Pathfinder Award in the evening at IPR’s Annual Distinguished Lecture & Awards Dinner.
Professor Gregory is delighted to receive the honour from the IPR. “It is one of the most prestigious awards in our field and I’m both honoured and humbled to join the list of eminent scholars and researchers who have received it,” she said.
“It’s been my passion to enhance the professionalism of public relations and increase recognition of its contribution to organisations and society. As a former practitioner myself, my research has always centred on the challenges and opportunities facing the practice and I am delighted that the IPR has seen the value of this applied focus through giving me this award,” she continued. “Our biggest challenge as a profession now is to step up to the leadership space and that is what my lecture in November will be about.”
Research focus
Professor Gregory is pictured meeting the Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy Brey at an International Public Relations Conference.
Professor Gregory’s research interests focus on capacity building in public relations and corporate communications and includes leadership, the strategic role of communications, ethics and globalisation. She has authored 30 book chapters and 50 journal articles/conference papers as well as written and edited more than 20 books, including the globally available Chartered Institute of PR series. She is also Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Communication Management.
“The IPR selection committee was impressed with many of Professor Gregory’s accomplishments,” said Donald K. Wright PhD, IPR Trustee and Harold Burson Professor & Chair in Public Relations at Boston University.
“She’s clearly noted as one of the leading public relations scholars from the United Kingdom and she has also made considerable contributions to the development of public relations research and education through her activities with the Global Alliance of Public Relations and the Chartered Institute of Public Relations,” he added.
- For tickets and information about the IPR Research Symposium or the IPR Annual Distinguished Lecture & Awards Dinner, please visit IPR’s event page.
- The Institute for Public Relations is an independent foundation dedicated to the science beneath the art of public relations™ and focusses on research that is immediately applicable in communications practice. Its research is available free at www.instituteforpr.org and provides the basis for the organisation’s professional conferences and events.
