It’s a beautiful week. My eyes are moist as I write this. It’s about something I plunged into four years ago because of a conviction and a belief to create something awesome with a lean team. Several people dissuaded me, several others questioned me and checked if I was in my right mind to give up lucrative offers in corporate communications and public relations consulting to build something that never was heard of. I had nothing to lose because I look at every venture as a learning experience and with the motive of giving back.
So, in the spring of 2015 an idea was given life and it took wings. A new category was being created and a lot is sacrifices were being made including numerous sleepless nights to build this labour of love. The passion paid off. After one year of implementing various ideas a glimmer of hope began to emerge. In 2016 and thereafter for two years a total of 20 youngsters committed a year of their lives to pursue training in a newly founded post-graduate school, by joining us in our tiny classroom in Mumbai where we imparted rigorous training over ten months to make true-blue professionals out of most of them. Last year we had five girls in the batch who signed up for the full-time programme and we hadn’t lost hope despite the small size. In the process we had learnt a lot ourselves and got our pedagogy right. The last few months of 2019 have been crazy – meeting several aspirants, interviewing them, administering entrance tests. We cherry picked some rockstars. And they are all headed to Mumbai as I type this.
This did not happen overnight. It meant a lot of strategising. And a long campaign. We ensured we built a formidable reputation through goodwill gained, respect earned, engagement created, affinity built, and trust increased. This happened through innovative ways, impactful planning and influence marketing. Storytelling with insights played a major role. In the end our product was accepted by many.
Today, we are all set to welcome over 20 young women and men from different parts of India who join us as part of the fourth batch. SCoRe probably the only #PRSchool that is by the PR profession, of the PR profession and for the PR profession. I can’t thank my co-founder enough. Hemant Gaule is the backbone of this endeavour. We also would like to thank hundreds of fellow professionals who have rendered us moral support and taught at the school. If you are one of them and have interacted with our students over the last three years, we owe it to you. We have had several mentors. The five who stand out are Bela & NS Rajan, Nitin Mantri, Sonya Madeira and Arun Sudhaman. Our former colleague Radhika Nandwani was part of the founding team and remains a friend. Anubhuti Mathur and Roshan Alexander have been a major support.
Our corporate immersions, guaranteed internships and 100% placements have been a huge hit. We ensure every candidate writes 100 blogs, meets 100 professionals and learns from over 100 campaigns during the tenure.
It’s amazing that we got this going. And we will someday be the public relations school that the world looks up-to. Thanks to those who stood by us. We will keep counting on you.
For now it is time to get back to the classroom and train the next generation of PR leaders.
He is also the Founding Dean of the School of Communications & Reputation (SCoRe).
He can be reached at @amithpr on twitter.
All the best Amith and team!