After a little over a year of having my email open to anyone and offering PR students to reach out to me for advice and help with their PR dissertations, I'm now done with this free service and free will to help. I'm shutting the PR mentoring down. I've kinda had enough.
I don't usually start or seek a rant, but I need to say all of this hoping that someone will be able to explain it to me.
I can't even count the number of thoughtless, pointless emails I've received over the past year:
This is 150 emails in just a year – with this stuff, and it's all mentioned as "urgent help needed".
Not one clever conversation (okay, maybe just one or two). I'm shocked.
There's no thinking. Only requests to give and do the work for them.
What happened with the ability to think? When did it go away? Why always expect that others will have it for you and you can get away with it? Why always the easy way? Isn't this your life? Why do you expect someone to fix it or make it for you? Why don't you want to take responsibility for your own development?
Where did your imagination go? Isn't there anything that actually interests you? Why even PR when you've no idea what exactly you like about it? Have you asked yourself that questions? It's so basic. I cannot tell you what you like.
And then the pitches. Students, what's in it for me? Why should I help you? What are you bringing to the table? You want to work in PR if you are studying it and are trying to write a dissertation about it, so why are you not even attempting to build the slightest relationship with me before asking me for a ton of help?
Someone help me understand this because I can't. Something must be wrong with me.
I am still going to continue running my Why Work in PR interview series and offer advice via blog posts only, but only blog posts! Just as with the media, my time is valuable. One's time is the most expensive and almost impossible to find commodity. Respect it.