This chapter briefly reviewed the core knowledge of regarding what it takes to make public relations the most effective or “excellent” that it can be, based on the findings of the IABC Excellence Study.Grunig, J. E. (1992). Being excellent is contributing to organizational effectiveness, whether that effectiveness is defined through goal attainment perspectives, strategic constituency building, or continued growth and survival. The 10 principles of excellence reviewed in this chapter are said to be “generic” because they apply across cultures, industries, types of organizations, and sizes of pursuit. The more of these factors that an organization has, the more effective its public relations function should be.
