Exclusive | We stand for quality, not quantity: Penn Schoen Berland's Ashwani Singla

Ever since it set up operations in India or rather commencing its South Asia operations about a year ago, Penn Schoen Berland (PSB) the Global Strategic Communication advisory firm has made a steady progress. Beginning with offices at Gurgaon and their corporate practice serving Indian and MNC clients, the advisory has recently commenced its Mumbai operations, launched its Political Consulting Practice besides strengthening its Corporate Affairs team with the appointment of a former Secretary to the Government of India. According to Ashwani Singla, PSB is positioned differently from any other Public Relations or Public Affairs agencies in the sense that it is a firm that provides research based advise the top management on the aspects of strategic corporate communications & corporate affairs. Adgully spoke to Ashwani Singla, Managing Director and Chief Executive, PSB on the current activities and the plans ahead. An industry veteran, Singla in his two decade of experience in the communication & service industry, has donned the role of a trusted advisor and strategist for building strong and effective communications strategy for top corporates, MNC’s,  Indian enterprises and emerging Indian MNCs across a wide range of sectors. Prior to his current role, Ashwani was the Chief Executive of Genesis Burson-Marsteller and Member of the Asia Pacific Board of Burson-Marsteller Worldwide.

 

Following is the conversation.

 

 

Ashwani Singla (AS): We commenced our operations in South Asia in April last year and today we have a strong team across our offices in Gurgaon and Mumbai. PSB has attracted solid talent, established a solid operating infrastructure and we have worked for a range of the bluest-of-blue-chip MNCs and Indian corporations with global ambitions. We are proud to have served our clients and thank them for putting their trust into something they knew to be the right thing to do but something not tried and tested before. I am delighted that their faith was not misplaced and we continue to build on their endorsement of our work for them. Our Political Consulting Practice has also taken roots and we have recently launched our Capital Markets Communication Service.

 

 

AS: What is the business we are in? We are in the business of PERSUASION. When you look at corporate equity from a CEO’s perspective? What keeps him awake at night are three things – negative image in public domain, how market & analysts value the company and third, how policymakers and regulators see the company impacting its license to operate. All these have severe implications on company’s competitive advantage. This is where we are unique :we use research to develop a deep understanding of a company’s stakeholders, benchmark perception, find their competitive differentiation. Armed with this knowledge we then work with the CEO and his team to execute their corporate image and corporate affairs agenda. This may involve advertising, online, media relations, internal communication, government relations and so on. PSB is platform agnostic and takes an integrated approach to help companies execute the strategy that we develop. We have brought lessons that we learned on our campaign trails and are bringing them to the board room.

 

 

AS: PSB is not a PR firm. People think PR is fundamentally press relations. Besides it rarely focusses on business impact and measurement of success continues to be challenge. On the other hand, our work is mostly in the board room, dealing with serious corporate image and corporate affairs challenges driven by strategic actions and communication and much more integrated than across stakeholders and mediums.

This is new category of work that is based on the ‘science of persuasion’. Our campaigns are based on our 3i approach: driven by deep insights, integrated across stakeholders and mediums and focused on deep impact on beliefs and behavior that gets audiences to act. You see in a political campaign, we have to get voters to vote for our candidate. Unlike market share, there is no second vote share. So our campaigns are all about getting a competitive edge to win.

 

 

AS: I tend to disagree. At the end of the day the basic principles of segmenting, targeting, positioning & acting remain the same. It’s how you apply them that matters. In politics it is all about identifying and connecting with the right voters. Competitive Differentiation is the key. We help our candidate stand apart and connect with his/her voters.

 

 

AS: PSB works as an advisor to its clients and we are quite happy to work with our client’s communication partners. We remain platform agnostic and focus on what is best for our client.

 

 

AS: The work that we do for our clients gives them a competitive edge and that is mission critical in a challenging economy and the current political climate.

 

 

AS: We are building PSB’s business one step at a time but with a sense of urgency. We are a niche consulting firm and want to remain so. Do meaningful and outstanding work for a few clients every year. We want to remain focused on solving problems for our clients and that requires dedicated time by seasoned professionals. We want to stay small and invaluable to our clients. This does not mean that we are not ambitious, our success will come from the success of our clients and that translates into value and loyalty. Currently we operate out of two offices in Delhi and Mumbai and maybe we will set up one in Bangalore if the need is felt. Beyond that I do not see opening more offices. We want to keep investing in talented people not real estate.

Our goal is to build a strong base of senior counselors working hands on with young but seasoned professionals. PSB has a flat structure – directors and associates. The team works full time on an engagement You see, it is a completely different service experience that PSB wants to build for a client. Rich in insights, sound knowledge of the domain and a very high quality service delivery.

 

 

AS: Through the course of my journey in building Genesis Burson-Marsteller into India’s finest PR firm, I propagated the need for insights and measurement. We pioneered many firsts in the industry, PSB was a natural progression to develop a new skill and take the corporate communication and corporate affairs to a new level in the country. Public Relations originated as a science and over the years became a commodity service. PSB is bringing science & intellectual rigor back into corporate communication.

 

 

AS: Our clients have shown great character and faith in us and our value proposition and I sincerely hope that others will also do so I remain optimistic as our research show that an overwhelming majority of clients want “insight based recommendations” and good solid people to execute, not just “hands and legs”. PSB fills this vacuum.

 

 

AS: We have developed a five year road map and are putting each block in its place. We want to stand for quality and not quantity. We commenced with Gurgaon, this year opened Mumbai, next year Bangalore perhaps. We have launched our Corporate and Political Practices and will introduce Media & Entertainment Practice sometime in the future. We have established Three Centers of Expertise, so lot has been accomplished.

 

Our focus right now is to ensure we deliver what we promise. Success will be its by product.