After analyzing the generic competences developed by the students in the Degree in Advertising and Public Relations in relation to the professional profiles that companies and institutions demand from the students in the curricular internship offers (Carretón and Lorenzo, 2016), the functions that the tutors of companies entrust to the students are described and they define the competences and professional profiles, making special emphasis in the field of public relations (Carretón and Lorenzo, 2018). In this context, through the analysis of content and the questionnaire, the aim is to describe whether there is a relationship between the tasks demanded by the companies and institutions, the preference of the students with regard to the tasks to be carried out and the profiles defined in the White Paper (2005). Despite the abundance of public relations tasks, the association with current professional profiles shows the great lack of knowledge about functions of a strategic and analytical nature. The results show some inconsistency between the tasks that the labour market demands from the students and the areas in which the students prefer to develop their profession, except for the explicit parallelism in the tasks of community manager and public relations. In addition, there is insufficient training in specific skills to prepare the PR professional, perhaps because of their misplacement at the operational levels (technical and tactical) and its conceptualization not strategic and analytical as international studies dictate. To the gap between the training received and the training requirements of the professionals who have been expressing different authors referenced, we must add some concerns far from the job opportunities. This thesis could explain the conceptual confusion, as well as its immature professionalization in Spain. The relationship reveals a necessary redefinition of professional profiles in public relations and communication, as well as an adaptation of skills in university training in public relations. With the current curriculum, this paper proposes three professional profiles at the Strategic Level: Director of Public Relations and Communication, Advertising Creative Director and 3. Director of Media Planning with the professional roles with mastery of techniques and tactics for their development at the Operational Level.
However, internships define tasks but not define professional profiles and, in any case, it can help to identify the functional areas where to develop the assigned tasks. Based on this premise and, in our opinion, we consider it necessary to restructure the Study Plans where perhaps Public Relations should go it alone and with its own competences that respond to the needs of organizations, companies, society and contribute to their professionalization.
Redefiniendo el perfil profesional de relaciones públicas
