Working In PR & Communications

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Agency versus in-house

You’ll often hear about PR jobs being ‘in-house’ or ‘agency’. But what the hell does that mean?

By Emily Morrison

Introduction

It sounds confusing but isn’t. A company might use PR agencies (or PR consultancies, as they are sometimes called) to do their communications for them, and they might do it themselves (in-house).

Most companies actually use a mixture of both. For example, Carphone Warehouse does its own communication strategy but uses agencies to do its promotional and image-building work.

What this means is that if you want to work in PR you can either choose to work for a PR agency or in the PR & Corporate Communications department within a company. But which to choose?

Agency

Some 8,600 people work in PR agencies in the UK.

Agency positives

  1. Normally you will work for several clients at the same time, meaning you gain broad experience of different companies and types of PR.
  2. This also means you learn excellent time management skills.
  3. It is a great way of building up your contacts both with clients and journalists, producers and editors; these contacts will be useful throughout your career.
  4. You will gain experience in many types of PR and comms.
  5. Your confidence will grow because an agency is often very busy and manic. You are taught and expected to be able to get on with things
  6. There is often a clearer career path because you are surrounded by other PR people, and are more likely to meet potential employers and hear about new opportunities.

Agency negatives

  1. You may become a “generalist”, which can be a good and bad thing: some people may think of you as a jack of all trades and a master of none.
  2. By juggling lots of different clients you will be unable to give each one your undivided attention.
  3. You will never get to know the client company as well as if you were working in-house.
  4. Harder to form meaningful relationships with colleagues in the client’s company.

In-House

Some 39,200 people work in-house in PR in the UK.

In-House Positives

  1. You can give your undivided attention to the company, you are not juggling other clients.
  2. Focus is uninterrupted.
  3. Get to specialise in one sector that you are interested in.
  4. Able to form long-lasting, meaningful relationships within the company – and with people outside the PR discipline.

In-House negatives

  1. You may suffer from a glass ceiling – there are few senior PR roles in your company.
  2. It is easier to go from an in-house job to agency than the other way round.
  3. Your list of contacts will not be as large as in an agency therefore restricting your coverage options.

This article is part of the unicornjobs.com guide to Working In PR & Communications. Click here to go to the guide index.

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